Full text of "Adventure v132 n05 [1957-05]"

See other formats

A SHOCKING TRUE STORY 


THE INCREDIBLE STEEL-TEETH MURDERS 

ADVENTURE 



OF 


THE MAN'S MAGAZINE 


I WATCHED HIM DIE! 

THE RAILROAD INTO HELL page 13 


The Wickedest Street 
in the World 


EXCITING FICTION AND FACT 


May, 25c 




ATTENTION FISHERMEN! 

Amazing 100 Year Old Gypsy Fish Bait Oil Formula 

MAKES FISH BITE 


—MYSTERIOUS SCENT MAKES SMELL FEEDING FISH 



























Cast your ballot for a successful future! 

S IIS. COKES 



Whether you stand at a machine or 
sit at a desk ... whether you’re mak¬ 
ing $75 a week or $75 hundred a 
year . . . whether your interest is 
Power Plants or Paper Pulp, Adver¬ 
tising or Electronics . .. chances are 
I. C. S. has exactly the course you 
need to get ahead. 

I.C.S. is not only the oldest and 
largest correspondence school. It 
also offers the most courses. 256 in 
all. Each one success-proved by grad¬ 
uates who rose to top technical and 
administrative positions. Chief en¬ 
gineers. Superintendents. Foremen. 
Managers. Executive assistants. 

I. C. S. Courses cover bedrock facts 
and theory plus practical, on-the-job 
applications. No skimping. Texts 


are prepared by leading business and 
industrial authorities working with 
I. C. S. editors and educators. They 
are constantly being reviewed and 
revised in line with current develop¬ 
ments. 

As an I. C. S. student, you study 
in your spare time, set your own 
pace. No time lost getting to class 
or waiting for slower students to 
catch up. If you wish, I.C.S. will 
make progress reports to your em¬ 
ployer. You win recognition as a 
“comer,” one who is ready to move 
ahead. Thousands of students report 
pay increases and promotions within 
a few months of enrollment. All 
graduates win the coveted, approved 
I. C. S. diploma. 


3 FREE BOOKS! Check the subject that interests you in the coupon below. I. C. S. will rush you (1) a special 
book outlining your opportunities in this field, (2) the 32-page gold mine of career tips, “How to Succeed," (3) a 
sample I. C. S. lesson (Math.) demonstrating the famous "I. C. S. Method.” “X” MARKS OPPORTUNITY. 


For Real Job Security-Get an I. C. S. Diploma! I. C. S., Scranton 9, Penna. HoX b Study Council 


















For fifteen minutes the hate- 
crazed mob battered Gene Sy- 
monds, then left him—in a pool 
of blood . page 13 


Volume 132, Number 5 May, 1957 

ADVENTURE 

The Man's Magazine of Exciting Fiction and Fact 




SSS* tssz oSS S3 s ssss 
























Learn Radio-Television 



RADIO-TV BROADCASTING (see above) offers 
important positions as Operators and Technicians. 
RADIO-TV SERVICING Technicians (see below) 
needed in every community. Their services are 
respected, their skill appreciated. 


you graduate. Mail 
a postcard or mail in 


Servicing or Communications 

by Practicing at Home 
in Spare Time 


tice building circuits common _ 

and TV sets. You LEARN-BY-DOING 
to locate Radio-TV troubles. As part of 
N.R.I. Servicing Course, you build Vacuum 
Tube Voltmeter and AC-DC receiver. Use 
VTVM to conduct experiments, 
earn extra money fixing 


Fast Growing Field Offers You 
Good Pay, Success, Bright Future 


Bigger than ever and still grow¬ 
ing fast. That’s why Radio-TV 
has special appal to ambitious 
t satisfied with their 


Added Income Soon - $10, $15 
a Week in Spare Time 

- —_- Soon after enrolling, many NRI students 

job and earnings. More than start to earn $10, $15 a week in spare time 

4,000 Radio and TV stations, fixing sets. Some pay for their training and 

More than 150 million home enjoy extr^ luxuries this way. Some make 

and auto Radios, 40 million enough to start their own Radio-TV shops. 

TV sets. Color TV promises NRI training is practical —gets quick results, 

added opportunities. For the Easy to understand, well illustrated lessons 

, there are good jobs, bright fu- teach you basic principles. And you LEARN- 

-ji Radio-TV Servicing or Broadcasting. BY-DOING by practicing with kits of equip- 

Training PLUS opportunity is the ideal men t which ''bring to life” things you study. 
combination for success. So plan now to get . .... . . . - „ 

into Radio-TV. The technical man is looked Find Out What NRI Otters 
up to. He does important work, gets good NRI has trained thousands for successful 

pay for it. Radio-Television offers that kind careers in Radio-TV. Study fast or slow—as 


Keep your job while training. You learn envelope. ACTUAL LESSON FREE. Also 64 
at home in your spare time. NRI is the page catalog that shows opportunities, shows 
OLDEST and LARGEST home study Radio- equipment you get. Cost of NRI courses low. 
TV school. Its methods have proved success- Easy terms. NATIONAL RADIO INSTITUTE, 


ful for more than 40 years. 


Dept. 7ER4 , Washington 9, D. C. 


N.R.I. TRAINED THESE MEN FOR SUCCESS 


ft 

3m 


"I was repairing Radios 
by 10th lesson. Now 
have good TV job.” 
M. R. LINDEMUTH, 
Fort Wayne, Ind. 


"I had a successful 
Radio repair shop. Noi 
I’m Engineer fo. 
WHPE.” V.W.WORK¬ 
MAN, High Point, N.C. 


hi 

"There are a number of 
f_ NRI graduates here. I _ mV 

r* ff can thank NRI for this WM 

V-JL job.” JACK WAG- Mm 

^ j'l NER, Lexington, N. C. - 


SEND FOR BOTH FREE 


"Doing spare ti_ 

pairs on Radio and TV. I National Radio 
time?” "cLYDE* HICL j Dept ‘ 7ER4 ' Washington 9, D. C. 

GINS, Waltham, Mass. J Mail me Sample Lesson and 64-Page Catalog ItTutiXla 

FREE. (No salesman will call. Please write plainly.) ®.°cl 


job.” JACK WAG¬ 
NER, Lexington, N. C. 

VETERANS Approved Under G.l. Bills 




MAY, 1957 










CAMPFIRE 


HENRI L. CHARLES ("The Wickedest Street 
in the World,” page 18) is a Montanan 
who rarely sees the old homestead having 
spent the greater part of the past twenty- 
five years in the Mid-East and Europe. 

Henri has been a newspaperman and 
writer for the past thirty years and ex¬ 
pects to continue being one for a while 
longer. He broke into the business in 
California on the Oakland. Tribune where 
he worked on general assignments and 
rewrite until 1932 when he got itchy feet, 
pulled stakes and by degrees worked his 
way to Europe. He had a succession of 
jobs including one of booking small 
American orchestras into Parisian night¬ 
clubs until he finally found honest employ¬ 
ment with the Daily Express of London. 

He helped cover France and Italy for 
the Express until 1940 when British cor¬ 
respondents in Italy were interned and 
later shipped home. Charles switched to 
writing for American publications from 
Italy, Germany and Switzerland and was 
in the latter country when Germany and 
Italy declared war on the United States. 
He returned to the United States in 1942, 
remaining only a few months and then 
shipping to England with a convoy and 
flying on to the Mid-East where he com¬ 
pleted a number of magazine assignments. 

He remained in the Mid-East, head¬ 
quartering in Egypt and Turkey and as 
the German armies retreated into the 
Fatherland, went into the Balkans where 
he saw the Red armies take over and 
begin the cold war before the hot war 
was finished. Returning to the United 


States in 1945, he stayed about a year 
and went back to the Mid-East and 
Europe where he has remained, with the 
exception of several brief trips home, 
writing magazine articles for American 
rfiagazines. 


DICK HALVORSEN, author of "The Dead¬ 
ly Blend,” page 16, was born in 
Brooklyn, N. Y., and being the son of an 
ex- sea captain, he started going to sea 
and seeing the world during school vaca¬ 
tions when he was fourteen. These 
wanderings continued until his gradua¬ 
tion from Dartmouth, where he played 
football and was twice elected All 
American in lacrosse. He became associate 
editor of the original "Sports Illustrated," 
then a Steve Hannagan press agent on the 
Indianapolis 500. He spent some time 
in Europe as a foreign correspondent and 
in Hollywood as a press agent. 

While writing the radio show, "We 
The People,” in New York, World War 
II exploded and Dick joined the Royal 
Canadian Air Force. After training he 
was assigned to the RAF as a nightfighter 
and was later sent to Africa where he 
fought until being shot down in 1943. 
He batted around Africa for another year 
recuperating from his wounds and ferry¬ 
ing fighters from Nigeria. In 1945 he was 
discharged. 

Since then he has spent most of his 
time free-lance writing, a job that entails 
a lot of globe-trotting. Dick flies about 
100,000 miles a year in all types of 


aircraft from helicopters to jets. In the 
past three years Dick has flown to Europe, 
Africa, Alaska, Greenland, the Carribbean 
Islands, South America, the North Pole— 
and inside the eye of a hurricane, this last 
for a story on the Air Weather Service. 

Dick lives in Huntington, L. I., with 
his pretty wife, Guri and their two lively 
youngsters, Ingrid, six, and Ricky, seven. 

“IT IS GRATIFYING,” Mathieu Jacques La- 
tour tell us, "that as an old adventure 
reader m^ first story is published in this 
magazine.” In the old days, Latour’s 
favorite authors were fellow adventurers 
like George Surdez who wrote about the 
French Foreign Legion, Gordon McCreagh 
and Talbot Mundy with their African 
stories and Arthur O. Friel with his 
stories of the Brazilian jungles. Latour’s 
article, "The Lady Who Ate Marines," 
page 44, is in the adventure tradition 
of fine true experiences. 

Born in Port au Prince, Haiti, Latour 
began his life as a soldier-of-fortune 
when he was a corporal in the Garde 
d’Haite, an outfit trained by the United 
States Marines. 

He has investigated many voodoo cere¬ 
monies, a subject which has always in¬ 
terested him and in the course of bringing 
in caco guerillas he has been shot at more 
than once. Of all his adventures with 
guerilla warfare in the hills, including 
run-ins with cacos, Dominicans and a 
nest of Jap spies which was landed in 
Haiti from Mexico during World War II, 
Latour admits his adventure with "The 
Lady Who Ate Marines” was the most 
bizarre. 

STYLED BY A REVIEWER as a "youngish old 
pro,” Will Cook ("Gunmen Die Sudden,” 
page 26) sold his first story to Popular 
Publications in 1952, and followed this 
up with seventy-five more in rapid suc¬ 
cession. In addition, he has written seven¬ 
teen novels and a motion picture script. 

Armed with two typewriters in his 
study, another that he carries around in 
the car, and one more in his sailing 
vessel. Will Cook writes no less than four 
books a year and usually works at them 
all at the same time. At home, on the 
road, or at sea, where he spends most of 
his time, he writes and somehow man¬ 
ages to assemble the material in one place 
to put postage on it. 



Dick Halvorsen (left) and Lt. Curtis Eaton before recent jet take-off. 


ADVENTURE 


Backed by a sketchy formal education, 
(he was an indifferent student) and a vast 
practical one. Will Cook’s everyday inter¬ 
ests are vastly different from his story 
matter. Asked to discuss the west, he will 
hand you a book. Ask him something 
about boats, (he designs them for a 
hobby) women, politics, guns, Elvis 



Will Cook is a sea-faring cowboy. 


Presley, etc., and he will talk until three 
in the morning. Ask him where he 
gets his ideas, he is unable to say, yet 
readily confesses that he gives away in 
outline form about three times what he 
manages to develop into a book or short 
story. Beginning writers make his home 
into a club for the drinks are free, the 
advice substantial, and there is always 
a spare idea, partially developed, just 
laying around for the asking. 

ROGER MARSH, one of Adventure's most 
popular experts (Military Weapons) is 
offering Adventure readers his publica¬ 
tions, "Weapons 1” and "Weapons 2,” a 
set of illustrated booklets on Russian 
small arms and aircraft guns. The book¬ 
lets, together with technidata sheets are 
available for $2.00 postpaid from 
Weapons, Inc.,‘P.O. Box 338, Hudson, 
Ohio. 

Mr. Marsh was chief foreign materials 
instructor in the Small Arms ORTC at 
Aberdeen Proving Ground during World 
War II where his discovery of the lack 
of American knowledge of Russian arms 
prompted the writing of these booklets. 
Mr. Marsh’s exhaustive technical knowl¬ 
edge of Russian arms and military equip¬ 
ment, as collected in "Weapons 1” and 
"Weapons 2,” was used by government 
agencies and the UN and proved valu¬ 
able in aiding our country in preparing 
to meet the ever-growing Russian threat 
of armed aggression. Mr. Marsh believes 
the sale of these booklets to those 
readers interested in small arms will lead 
to the further extension of American 
awareness of foreign weapons. ■ ■ 

MAY, 1957 7 



Are THE TALES of strange 
human powers false? Can the mys¬ 
terious feats performed by the 
mystics of the Orient be explained 
away as only illusions? Is there an 
intangible bond with the universe 
beyond which draws mankind on? 


women masters of their lives. There 
IS a source of intelligence within 
you as natural as your senses of sight 
and hearing, and more dependable, 
which you are NOT using now! 
Challenge this statement! Dare the 
Rosicrucians to reveal the functions 


Does a mighty Cosmic intelligence 
from the reaches of space ebb and 
flow through the deep recesses of 
the mind, forming a river of wisdom 
which can carry men and women to 
the heights of personal achievement? 

Have You Had These 
Experiences? 

.that unmistakable feeling that 

you have taken the wrong course of 
action, that you have violated some 
inner, unexpressed, better judgment. 
The sudden realization that the silent 
whisperings of self are cautioning 
you to keep your own counsel — not 
to speak words on the tip of your 
tongue in the presence of another. 
That something which pushes you 
forward when you hesitate, or re¬ 
strains you when you are apt to 
make a wrong move. 

These urges are the subtle influence 
which when understood and directed 
has made thousands of men and 


of this Cosmic mind and its great 
possibilities to you. 

Let This Free Book 
Explain 

Take this infinite power into your part¬ 
nership. You can use it in a rational and 
practical way without interference with 
your religious beliefs or personal affairs. 
The Rosicrucians, a world-wide philo¬ 
sophical movement, invite you to send 
today for your free copy of the fascinat¬ 
ing hook “The Mastery of Life” which 
explains further. Address your request 
to: Scribe Y.D.A. 

The ROSICRUCIANS 

(AMORC) 

San Jose, California 
The Rosicrucians are not a religious organization 

USE THIS COUPON 1 

Scribe Y.D. A. 

The Rosicrucians, AMORC, 

San Jose, California. 

I am sincerely interested in know¬ 
ing more about this unseen, vital 
power which can be used in acquiring 
the fullness and happiness of life. 
Please send me, without cost, the 
book, ‘‘The Mastery of Life,” which 
tells how to receive this information. 

Name 


Address 


State 

















ADVE 



JESS 


OVEEIDXCinNrE: 


THINGS YOU SHOULD KNOW ABOUT YOUR 

LIFE-AND HOW TO LIVE IT TO THE UTMOST 
by I. R. GAYER 


ARSENIC IN YOUR CIGARETTES: We 

smoke, too, and facts like these aren’t 
going to deter us, but you might be in¬ 
terested to learn that in 1932-33 the 
arsenic content of cigarettes averaged 
12.6 micrograms per cigarette. Twenty 
years later, according to Dr. Henry S. 
Satterlee in the "New England Journal 
of Medicine,” the arsenic content aver¬ 
aged 42 micrograms per cigarette—an 
increase of over 300 per cent. 

How arsenic gets into cigarettes and 
other tobacco is very simple, Dr. Sat-, 
terlee explains. Tobacco growers use 
arsenate of lead as an insecticide to 
protect the growing plants. He grants 
that they have been using other type 
insecticides in recent years, but that, he 
insists, "cannot purify soils of tobacco 
plantations that have, for many years, 
been impregnated by residues of a heavy 
and relatively insoluble poison, arsenate 
of lead, which will continue to release 
in soluble form arsenic which happens 
to be the only component of tobacco 
smoke that, as yet, is definitely known 
to be a cause of cancer for man. 

"Not only are we getting arsenic in 
cigarette smoke," his statement contin¬ 
ues, "but also in our city atmospheres, 
from the combustion of fuel oils in fur¬ 
naces and gasoline in motor vehicle 
engines, from the grindings of syn¬ 
thetic rubber tires op asphalt and from 
the minute scrapings of tarred or oiled 
roads.” Dr. Satterlee, who is a chemist 
as well as a physician, indicates that the 
female body is much more efficient in 
excreting the end products of arsenic 
metabolism than is the male body, a 
reason that experts in the lung cancer 
field believe is why lung cancer is not, 
in the main, a female disease. 

BAD DEBTORS MORE ACCIDENT PRONE? 

Bad debtors appear to be accident-prone, 
according to a Harvard University re¬ 


searcher. Pointing out that "a man drives 
as he lives,” Dr. Ross A. McFarland 
described a controlled .study of truck 
drivers which revealed that 34 per cent 
of the accident repeaters were also in 
trouble with credit bureaus. Among the 
accident-free drivers, only 6 per cent 
had any trouble paying their debts. 

NEW TAPE REPLACES STITCHES: A new 

plastic tape has been found superior to 
conventional "stitching” of wounds and 
incisions, according to a report by Dr. 
Paul Williamson of Albuquerque, New 
Mexico, in the "Medical Times.” He 
describes' results with the new tape in 
over 1,000 cases as'"unbelievably good,” 
with significant improvement in speed 
of wound healing, lower incidence of 
infection, and almost complete absence 
of the scarring so often left when con¬ 
ventional sutures are removed. 

The new tape, a polyester film, looks 
much like ordinary Scotch tape, but 
one side is coated with a special skin 


adhesive developed by the Minnesota 
Mining and Manufacturing Company. 
Small holes in the tape are placed di¬ 
rectly over the wound to permit free 
egress of wound secretions. Preliminary 
studies have also found that the tape is 
self-sterilizing, and the fact that scarring 
can be practically eliminated is of the 
utmost importance in facial wounds. 

Application of the new tape is de¬ 
scribed as painless and the use of local 
anesthesia necessary for suturing wounds 
can be largely eliminated. Instead of 
the usual painful removal of stitches 
after the wound is healed, the tape usu¬ 
ally comes away freely when it is time 
to remove the gauze dressing that is 
placed over it. Your doctor or hospital 
may not have it yet, but probably within 
the next few months the use of this tape 
will be general in the surgical field. 

LIFE-SAVING ANTIBIOTIC FOR INFEC¬ 
TIONS: The new antibiotic Cathomycin, 
which can be a life-saver in treating in¬ 
fections caused by certain bacteria that 
have become resistant to other antibiot¬ 
ics, is now available to physicians and 
hospitals, thanks to Sharp & Dohme, 
Division of Merck & Company, which 
developed the antibiotic. Extensive clin¬ 
ical investigations have confirmed the 
original favorable laboratory studies of 
some months ago, and in addition clin¬ 
icians have indicated that the unusually 
high blood levels developed by Catho¬ 
mycin in the human body revealed an 
increased effectiveness against infecting 
organisms which could not be predicted 
from the earlier lab studies. 

Bacterial resistance is an increasingly 
important problem and Cathomycin has 



ADVENTURE 








proved to be particularly effective against 
Staphylococci, the bacteria that cause 
most skin infections and become a 
source of grave danger when they enter 
the blood stream. Staphylococci are often 
responsible for such conditions as ab¬ 
scesses, boils, Carbuncles, and the very 
serious bone disease osteomyelitis, and 
frequently cause infections in cuts and 
postoperative wounds. Among the sys¬ 
temic diseases which are often fatal are 
septicemia and endocarditis. What is 
more, Cathomycin has a high degree of 
safety for the patient when supervised 
by a physician and starts to have effect 
in as little as one to two hours, the time 
usually taken to become absorbed into 
the blood stream. 

THE SIZE OF YOUR FAMILY MAY DETER¬ 
MINE YOUR DEVELOPMENT: Taking men 
and women who had been brought up 
in large families, scientific investigators 
found two out of every three were well- 
adjusted persons, one of every four was 
medium in adjustment to other people 
and one of every nine was poorly ad¬ 
justed. Although science hasn’t done a 
comparable study of the emotional ad¬ 
justment of men and women brought up 
in small families, the fact that only two 
,out of 457 children of large families 
studied were ever patients in mental 
hospitals is worthy of note. University 
of Pennsylvania scientists have had the 
879 children of 100 families with at 
least six children each under study for 
six years, but the study on adjustment 
had to be limited to fifty-eight of the 
100 families because the data was not 
complete on all 100. These fifty-eight 
families had a total of 457 offspring, 
235 men and 222 women. Of the 457, 
fifty-one were poorly adjusted, twenty 
men and thirty-one women. 

Speaking generally of all the families 
under study, the in-between children 
showed a higher .rate of good and me¬ 
dium adjustment than first- and last-born 
children. The best record was that of 
the fourth-born. The first-born had the 
poorest record but the last-born were 
next. They emphasized that in not one 
of the fifty-eight families of six or more 
children were there more than three 
who were poorly adjusted, proving that 
the factors involved in lack of personal 
adjustment are at least individual. 

They defined being well adjusted as 
follows: "If a person is capable of ar¬ 
ranging his relations to other persons, at 
work, in the horne, and in social rela¬ 
tions with reasonable propriety and 
success, he is a well-adjusttd person.” 

MAY, 1957 


POLIO HITS ADULTS HARDEST: Despite 
the Salk Vaccine, for quite a while polio 
will remain a problem, and in the last 
epidemic in New England, it was 
found that the ailment was difficult to 
check clinically because of the high pro¬ 
portion of adults afflicted, since it hits 
the older patient harder, according to 
Dr. Louis Weinstein of the Massa¬ 
chusetts Memorial Hospital. 

His own study indicates that patients 
over forty, for example, need respirator 
treatment eleven times more often than 


those under fifteen years, and have a 
mortality rate seven times higher. What 
distinguished the 1955 epidemic, accord¬ 
ing to Dr. Weinstein, was the fact that 
twenty-six per cent of those affected 
were twenty years of age or older. The 
incidence in males is greater than in 
females in the ages up to fifteen, and 
from thirty-nine to sixty-five years, but 
this ratio is reversed in the sixteen to 
thirty-nine age group, possibly because 
of increased susceptibility to polio dur¬ 
ing pregnancy. ■ ■ 



9 
















FREE! US. STAMPS 

PLUS COMPUTE U. S. CATALOG 



Men’s Mart 



$250,000 went into the engineering of this self-contained push-button pocket recorder 
used in police work all over the world. Fine German craftsmanship has made it a record- 
erase-playback unit small enough (3%,x 6% x 1%") to fit in coat or pants pocket. It 
weighs less than 2 lbs, has a 4 hour spool, runs on batteries or electricity. Records con¬ 
versation or music anytime, anyplace, without anyone knowing it. Records through 
plastic mike (1), well-detailed dummy wrist watch mike (2), tiny mike with suction cup 
(3) that fastens on telephone, records two-way conversation without telltale blips. Plays 
back through stethoscopic type earphones (4), radio or phonograph with attachment (5). 
About $289.50. For full information: Lincoln Electronics, 1305-A Lincoln Bldg, N. Y. 17. 


AN/* Hunger hurts! 
$1 sends 22 lbs. 
^ to a family overseas 
CARE Food Crusade 



STAG PARTY CLASSICS 



BERNARD OF HOLLYWOOD 
Box 46977, Los Angeles 46, Cal. Dpt. F-5 


N Q W , TEST YOUR OWN 


TV-RADIO TUBES! 

Even The Picture Tube 



GEIGER ENGINEERING CORP. 

Dept. KL-100, 3738 W. Lawrence Ave, Chicago, III. 


NEW MOLD-PRODUCED CHEMICAL 
FOR FALLING HAIR 



Air Force veterans in the audience will 
recognize this giant-sized (5% ft- x 3 ft.) 
insignia which has been mounted on thou¬ 
sands of planes. Strong, and with the f^el of 
oilcloth, they cost the government some 
$18 each. Now, should you want one to deco¬ 
rate your boy’s room, your basement, den- 
or game room, they are just $2 ppd. New 
surplus. Kline’s, 329 East 65th St, N.Y. 



This, as you probably recognize, is a fairly 
sizable diamond, and should you be in¬ 
terested in purchasing one you can get a 
catalogue of ’em free by writing Kaskel’s, 
Dept. 704-C, 41 West 57th St, New York 19, 
N. Y. The catalogue covers information 
about diamonds in general, rings, pfrls, 
bracelets and othyr geegaws in particular. 
Prices range from $25 right on up to $5,000. 


ADVENTURE 



























SHOP BY MAIL WITH ADVENTURE 

All products shown here may be obtained directly from indicated sources. Send check or 
money order with your order. Manufacturer will refund full purchase price on prompt return 
of unused, non-personalized items. This department is not composed of paid advertising. 



There’s a lot of stamps in the above photo¬ 
graph—500 to be exact, although some are 
covering others. They’re from all parts of 
the world, include the Monaco Grace Kelly 
wedding stamp, 4 Roosevelt memorial 
stamps from 4 countries, the only triangle 
stamp ever issued by the U.S, and others. 
With literature, stamps on approval, $1 ppd. 
Globus Stamp, Dept. 55, 268 4th Ave., N.Y. 



For those interested in hypnotism—a record 
with details for hypnotizing individuals or 
a group, as well as suggestions for self¬ 
hypnosis. Record has echo chamber Metro¬ 
nome background. It comes complete with 
eye-fixation spots. Unbreakable, extended 
play 10", 78 rpm recording. Complete, it’s 
84.95 ppd. Order from Hypnotic-Aids Re¬ 
cordings, Dept. AY-3, 30 E. 20th St., N.Y. 



A pocket alarm watch makes a useful gift 
for any man. This fine 7-jewel Swiss-made 
one can be set on the quarter hour, rings 
with a sharp, clear tone. Hack opens to form 
a stand, makes watch double as a desk or 
night-table clock. Second sweep, luminous 
dial, hands. Excellent buy for 813.95 ppd., size 
makes it handy for business or sportsmen. 
Prince Enterprises, 103-Y Park Ave., N.Y. 



A new version of a very useful instrument, 
this TV and radio tube tester will test all 
tubes right up to the picture tube, save 
you enough dough the first time to more 
than pay for what a repairman would charge 
for a house call—and the first thing he’d do 
is check the tubes. Also checks continuity 
in electrical appliances. 83.95 ppd., and 
worth it. Chabon Scientific, 60 E. 42nd, N.Y. 



OMT 

msr CUSS MAIl 
MRP wav post 

5 ***** 

SPtCIAl OfUVfkY 

AIR MAIl 


What with the package-sending season just 
about here, this little rubber stamp can save 
you a lot of time and trouble. Actually, 
it’s twelve stamps in one, and contains all 
the proper sayings so that the post office 
can handle your packages properly. If you 
went out and bought them individually, 
you’d spend 810. This one’s 82 ppd. 
Lord George, Ltd, 1270 Broadway, N.Y. 


GIVE BLOOD! 

See Your Local Red Cross 
Chapter, Today) 



STRAIGHT FROM THI 
ORIGINALS 
, THOSE SHOCKING 
^yTHOSEylJUIMATE 



STAG 
TORIES 

A fantastic opportunity 
to obtain a daring, pri- 
vitely printed edition 
featuring those rare 
slag story favorites you 
used to pass along on 
typewritten paqes. 
Some you'll remember. 


inal form. Every detail 
intact, every descrip¬ 
tion vivid. They'll leave 
you breathlessl 


HE MIDGET AND THE 
DUCHESS • THE YOUNG 
LADY AND HER DOG ‘ I 
WAS CAPTIVE TO SIX 
WOMEN » DAY IN LIFE 
OF A TRAVELING SALES¬ 
MAN • SHE STOOPS TO 
CONQUER, and many oth- 


PRIVATE EDITIONS 

Malllne Address 
■OX SUSS. Dept. A-5 
LOS ANGELES 46 , CALIFORNIA 



SENSATIONAL GET-ACQUAINTED OFFER 

For stamp collectors anti EVERYONE seeking an 
exciting new hobby. Get this big valuable collection 
of genuine, all-difiercnt postage stamps from Green- 


gfiphVujS oth° 



MAY, 1957 






































the fastest cure for worry about cancer: a call to your doctor now! 


Scared? You shouldn’t be! Look at it this way. 
The average man who walks into the doctor’s 
office walks out floating. That lump that was so 
frightening . . . nothing to worry about at all! 
The sky’s bluer, the air’s sweeter, it’s a great 
big beautiful day . . . because he picked up that 
hone and called! 

t happens all the time. It can happen to you. 
"Sure,” you say, "but just supposing”... OK. 
Let’s look at the facts. In past years, we were 


saving 1 out of 4 cancer patients. Today, we’re 
saving 1 in 3. And the odds could get better still 
... if people would call their doctors in time! 

So go ahead...call. See your doctor now. And 
after your checkup—how about a check for the 
American Cancer Society? Every dollar sends 
us further along the road to cure. And when 
that happens ... it’s going to be a wonderful day 
for us all! Send your check to "Cancer” in care 
of your local Post Office. 


ADVENTURE 



UP reportei, Gene Symonds (left), interviewed Philippine presidential candidate, Ramon Magsaysay in 1953. 

I Watched Him Die! 

THE RAILROAD INTO HELL 

Gene Symonds, American correspondent, was murdered by Singapore’s com¬ 
munists. His legs and arms were broken, his ribs crushed, his jaw dislocated, 
his lungs and groin caved in and his brain laid bare. Here is the 
story of a tolerant, heroic man who fought for freedom and who died doing it! 


STARTS NEXT PAGE t 



by henry jordan 


0 Y 

O' 




Tough band of organized communists, 4,000 strong, incited riots against British rule in Singapore. 


M alaya’s jungle railroad was one of the great 
romantic construction feats of the earlier part 
of the century. Chiefly built by American-trained 
Australians and Canadians, it had to be hacked step 
by step into the ever-encroaching tropical forest. 

The natives the builders encountered were gentle 
and friendly, but nature was not. Tigers were for¬ 
ever swarming around the work camps. Rails laid 
one week would be uprooted the next by marauding 
elephants, who turned out to be the biggest nuisance. 
They used the railroad bed as a convenient trail, and 
used tunnels as cool resting places during the heat 
of the day. Sometimes an angry elephant would 
charge a train. Usually elephant encounters re¬ 
sulted in death to the foolhardy creature and de¬ 
railment of the train. 

When the gentle natives saw what the white 
man’s labors had produced they stopped being their 
good-natured selves. They imagined that demons 
were traveling through the glinting rails and tore 
them out. They saw in the kreta apis —fire carriages, 
as they named the trains—something like a hell on 
wheels, and with extraordinary savvy managed to 
throw over a switch and spike it down in the hope 
of wrecking the evil wagon. 

But finally man and beast accepted the inevitable 
and made peace with the cannonballing steel mon¬ 
sters. Settlements, as busy and neon-lit as American 
towns, sprang up along the road. The trains, among 


the first to be air-conditioned, were well-known for 
the luxury of their accommodations and the inter¬ 
esting passengers who used the line. 

On one of Malaya’s crack trains you could count 
on meeting wild animal hunters, jungle explorers, 
gold hunters, rubber planters, mining engineers, and 
British colonial administrators and their wives who 
looked down on the rest of the human species— 
particularly on some fat, little sultan taking his 
voluptuous wives for a picnic by the sea. 

Shortly after War II all changed along the famous 
jungle railroad. The natives became restive again. 
Communist-led guerillas organized an all-out attack 
on the British rulers. Trains not only traveled hori¬ 
zontally but skyward, propelled by dynamite charges. 
Gunners would shoot them up and fade behind the 
green wall of the jungle again. Singapore, the 
steamy, glittery metropolis just across the Strait from 
the railroad terminal, had suddenly become a hell 
with a dozen time bombs relentlessly ticking away 
in its swampy foundations. . . . 


ene Symonds’ nerves were getting frazzled. 
"What was that noise?" he asked sharply 
over the clatter of a teleprinter. 

The Malayan office boy, brewing tea in a corner 
of the newsroom, snickered. "Big bomb, maybe?" 
For three days now (Continued on page 63) 


14 


Terrorists, seeking revenge for death of student, chanted, “Blood 
for blood!” before hate-crazed attack on Syinonds in Delta Road. 
























Wife and lover were ready, 
so was a poisoned drink. Only the 
husband was needed to make 



The 

Deadly 

Blend 

by DICK HALVORSEN 


W hen the house phone rang the woman answered 
it, slowly, without any special interest. 

"A package for your husband,” said the doorman. 
"Shall I send it up, Mrs. Warriner?’’ 

"A package?” Her voice was curiously dead, un-, 
emotional. "Yes. Give it to the elevator boy.” 

She hung up and moved languidly to look out the 
open French window in the living room. Sixteen 
stories below the city crawled with life, noise, ex¬ 
pectancy. It was a magnificent city, a city built out 
of men’s dreams and harboring millions of dreams 
for the future. 

Eva Warriner, -who had been Eva Kalowski, did 
not see the sights nor hear the sounds of the metro¬ 
polis below her. She had no use for the city. It had no 
use for her. She was above it, protected, insular, a 
lovely automaton in a vacuum of her own making. 

When the doorbell rang, it was as though a button 
had been pressed that once more started her in motion. 
Limply shrugging off a mood of slight irritation, she 
moved across the room, opened the door. 

"Got a package for you,, ma’am,”' the elevator 
boy said respectfully. (Continued on page 70) 


The drapery was billowing out. Eva 
screamed — a high, rasping shriek. 

17 





by HENRI L. CHARLES 


London s illicit love sells for less than in any other large 
city in the western world. A dockside doxie does well to 
get a handful of change, while a Bond Street cutie with a 
luxury apartment is likely to command top fees of fifty dollars 
or more. All in all, it’s big business and, as one of them 
said, “ It’s only half price for the clergy!” 

Street in the World 


T he soft English twilight cast long shadows over 
the bustling movement of London’s noisy, teem¬ 
ing Piccadilly Circus as the Reverend Dr. Hewlett 
Johnson, the famous "Red Dean” of Canterbury, 
strode along Regent Street togged out in his tradi¬ 
tional knee breeches and clerical garb. He was rush¬ 
ing to a meeting of British Commies where he 
expected to extoll the virtues of the Soviet Union 
and his thoughts were far away in the Russian Peo¬ 
ples’ Paradise. 

Suddenly the well-known churchman became 
conscious that he was not alone, his pink day-dreams 
evaporated and he jerked back to the reality of 
Piccadilly with a startled gasp. A good-looking, 
flashily dressed brunette, about twenty years old, had 
grasped his arm caressingly and he was horrified to 
note that he could feel her feminine softness against 
his manly shank as she trotted closely by his side. 

"Come on, dearie,” she coaxed, tugging coquet - 
tishly at his straining arm, "Half an hour with me 
will make a new man out of you. I’m the best on 
MAY, .1957 


the street—guarantee you a good time. Besides, it's 
only half price for the clergy, you know.” 

The Red Dean almost ripped his gaiters on the 
spot. The girl’s cheap, musty perfume wafted up 
and drove the blood to his head. He stared down at 
the young face under a heavy coating of cosmetics 
and his consternation turned to righteous indigna¬ 
tion as she winked up at him through long false 
eyelashes. 

"Why you . . . you brazen young strumpet!” 
sputtered the flabbergasted Dr. Johnson as he 
roughly disengaged his arm and backed off. "Why, 
nothing like this could occur in Moscow.” 

"Oh, one of them Russky lovers,” remarked the 
spurned lady witheringly. "Maybe you’d prefer old 
Krushy. Well, cheerio, lead-pants.” And having had 
the last word she left the astonished clergyman 
gaping and slipped away in the throng to search 
for a live one. 

The friends of the Soviet-Union got along with¬ 
out a speaker that night. (Continued on page 74) 


19 




The Night I Looked Into Hell 


W hen the telephone jangled alongside my bunk early 
that Sunday morning I knew there was trouble some¬ 
where in Division One. 

"Chief Adams,” the dispatcher said excitedly, "we’ve got 
a greater alarm going at Berth Ninety and Mormon Street!” 

Shaking the sleep from my eyes I realized that Berth Ninety 
and Mormon do not intersect. What’s more, a mile and a half 
stretch of the waterfront’s Main Channel separates them. I’ve 


never known our dispatchers to get rattled over an alarm 
location, though this was one time they had plenty of cause 
for excitement. They had heard the report of a sharp blast 
and felt an awesome concussion quake at their San Pedro 
City Hall alarm center. 

Seconds later our signal office switchboard blossomed into 
a hodge-podge of buzzing red lights and the Gamewell firebox 
system registered dozens of alarms from locations over widely 







The Night I Looked Into Hell 


CONTINUED 


“The engines throbbed as we hammered at the flames with everything we had. We pumped twelve thousand 


scattered areas of the sprawling Los Angeles waterfront. 

The deluge of alarms during those first moments of pande¬ 
monium made it impossible to pinpoint the blast’s center. 
Some callers told us they were certain an ammunition ship 
had exploded in the Outer Harbor Loading Area. Others, 
gaping in horror at the shimmering orange glow welling up 
from the heart of the waterfront, feared we were under 
atomic attack. Firemen in our harbor stations were jolted 
awake by the shattering impact. Their captains reported they 
were responding with their rigs toward the ominous glow. 

Although the explosion was in my home battalion I was 
acting division commander that night and headquartered at 
Engine Sixty-Six’s house so I knew nothing until the dis¬ 
patcher called. The impossible location he gave me was my 
first hint that I was shortly to be confronted with Los Angeles’ 
worst harbor disaster. 


Figuring that I could pick up the correct address over my 
two-way radio after I got rolling, I awakened my driver, 
Frank Bowen, as I dove for my turn-out clothes. Moment? 
later our siren and light cleared a path for us down Figueroa 
Street. 

We hadn’t gone far when I saw a distant glow which sent 
shivers down our spines. I had, up to the night of June 21, 
1947, put in nineteen years as a fire-fighter, many of them 
along the waterfront, but this was the most) awful loom-up 
I’d ever seen. The entire sky over the harbor—sixteen miles 
away from me—was tinted orange, a panorama that could 
only be described as the sun itself rising at two o’clock in the 
morning. The flaming smear was so broad I could not tell 
whether the fire was in the San Pedro, Wilmington or 
Terminal Island sections of Los Angeles. The loom-up bulged 
bigger and -bigger as our Buick (Continued on page 87) 


22 


ADVENTURE 





gallons per minute . . 


“Explosive petroleum gas cylinders were in that shed .. 


“It took two days to cool the 
Markay enough to hoard her 
flame-blackened hull. We found 
nine corpses below decks . . 


“There was one way to stop that fire—plow into it!” 


MAY, 1957 


23 






The dessicated body of Rudi Lorentz, one of the “Baroness’ ” discarded lovers. 


discovered on lonely beach. 



Steel-Teeth Murders 


Picture an island of Eden populated by human monsters—and ruled by a female devil! 

by LEROY THORP 

INTERNATIONAL NEWS PHOTOS 


F or many decades, an English ex-doctor named W. Somer¬ 
set Maugham has made an excellent living writing realistic 
stories about goings-on in out-of-the-way places. Just one of 
these tales, "Rain”—a grim narrative of the fatal association 
between a bigoted missionary and a prostitute in trouble 
with the law—earned him more money than most persons 
ever see through publication, dramatization, motion-picture, 
and other rights. 

Yet nothing Maugham ever wrote has more stark realism 
than the true story of a grisly horror that occurred on the 
tiny volcanic island of Floreana, in the Galapagos archi- 

24 


pelago, in the early 1930’s. Maugham, in fact, would prob¬ 
ably have shied away from writing it for fear it would not 
be believed. Demonstrating the old adage, "Truth is stranger 
than fiction,” it contained literally every element of the 
most lurid melodrama—a fantastic setting, phony nobility, 
insanity, nymphomania, sadism and masochism, and brutal 
murder. As a study in abnormal psychology it can hardly 
be surpassed. 

It would never have happened except for the idealistic 
romanticism of "the man with the steel teeth.” Because of 
his dream it did happen—the nightmare that might be 

ADVENTURE 


titled: "The Incredible Murders in the Garden of Eden. 

Here is that strangest of all true stories: 

Friedrich Ritter was born in Germany about the year 1888. 
His father—according to a series of articles he wrote for 
"Atlantic Monthly” in the fall of 1931—was a well-to-do- 
farmer, carpenter, and building contractor. Friedrich was a 
medium-sized, somewhat sickly boy who was not much good 
at sports and games and spent a great deal of time alone, 
reading tales of exploration and adventure. His propensity 
for solitude was enhanced by the fact that the schoolmaster 
of his formative years was a disciplinarian and a sadist, 
a "firm believer in the hazel switch, which he never let out 
of his hand.” 

Like many introverts, Friedrich was a good student. In¬ 
tending to become a medical doctor, he entered the Univer¬ 
sity of Freiburg, but the Kaiser’s war to dominate Europe 
and the Middle East interrupted his studies, and he served 
throughout the war in the artillery. Following the Armistice 
he completed his studies, received his M.D. and started a 
practice in Berlin which proved highly successful and earned 
him a great deal of money. Besides being a competent doc¬ 
tor he was also almost painfully gentle and sympathetic, 
qualities many patients appreciated. 

He had married, but he had little affinity for his wife, 
who had turned out to be an unimaginative and somewhat 
stuffy hausfrau. They were husband and wife in name only, 
an arrangement which suited both perfectly. This was the 
situation when he acquired a new patient—Dore Strauch, 
the pretty, imaginative, vibrant, and young wife of an aging 
schoolmaster. 

Dore was dark-haired, fair-skinned, and in her early 
twenties. Her marriage had been solely one of convenience, 
one of those arranged affairs. Both she and Friedrich were 
embittered by life—by their marriages, by the mad rush of 
modern existence, by the hypocrisy they saw everywhere, by 
the ominous rise of fascism. To Dore, Friedrich confided the 
dream that had remained with him since boyhood—to flee 
from society to an Eden where he could dwell and work 
unmolested (he wanted to write philosophy), free from any 
contact with civilization. He asked her if she would go 
with him. 

Dore yearned for the primitive life as much as he, she 
was in love with him, and she accepted with alacrity. As he 
wrote of her, he had found "a companion who fully shared 
my point of view, and who was not appalled by the prospect 
of the physical hardships.” Both were eager, of their "own 
free will and choice,” to go into exile, "to seek, in the soli¬ 
tude of an almost desert island in the far Pacific, the inde¬ 
pendence, the peace of mind, the opportunity to cultivate 
our reflective powers to the fullest, which are denied to man 
by the complexities of moden life.” 

The dream itself was not unusual, practically everybody 
has experienced it at some time or other. But Friedrich and 
Dore were better-equipped than most to carry it out; for 
one thing, they had unlimited money and plenty of foresight. 

Floreana, the island on which they meant to settle, was 
not chosen for their Eden by chance. They wanted a place 
where the climate is equable the year round, with no ex¬ 
tremes of temperature, and the Galapagos, located on the 
equator several hundred miles west of the Ecuadorean coast, 
had no change of seasons other than wet and dry and was 

MAY, 1957 



“Baroness” von Wagner-Bousquet, whose sadism and 
power-mania led to degradation, madness—and murder. 


comfortably cooled by the Humboldt Current, which orig¬ 
inates in the Antarctic. The fifty or so islands comprising 
the group were all peaks of extinct volcanoes that jutted up 
forbiddingly from the ocean depths. The shorelines were 
jumbled masses of tortured lava, but higher up on the moun¬ 
tain slopes, there was a wide variety of lush tropical vegeta¬ 
tion. Giant turtles and other strange beasts crawled over the 
rocks. Of Galapagos the naturalist Darwin once wrote: "It 
seems to be a little world in itself; the greater number of' its 
inhabitants, both vegetable and animal, being found no¬ 
where else.” 

Some of the larger islands in the group were inhabited; 
Floreana—which was only about ten miles long—was not. 
Once before settlers had tried to make a go of living there 
but had given up, primarily because of the solitude; the 
nearest island was 100 miles away. But to Friedrich and 
Dore the solitude was an advantage. 

They were very thorough in their preparations. Friedrich, 
whose teeth were bad anyway, had all his remaining teeth 
extracted and a set of mst-proof stainless steel dentures 
made and coated with white enamel for appearance’s sake. 
The supplies they purchased—amounting to almost half a 
ton—included guns and ammunition, binoculars, a wide 
variety of tools, cooking utensils, clothing, bolts of fabrics, 
canvas, nails, wire, rope, seeds of various vegetables and 
fruits that might grow on the island, books and writing 
materials and medical supplies. Livestock consisted of 
chickens and a pair of cats. 

Arrangements were even made for Friedrich’s wife to 
move into Dore’s husband’s home as housekeeper. 

On July 4, 1929, the couple sailed from Amsterdam on 
the freighter Boskope. After several transfers, they were put 
ashore on Floreana on September 19th; this was about par 
for the trip. They landed at Postoffice Bay—a rugged little 
harbor where, years before, somebody had set up an empty 
barrel for the reception of messages. Although Floreana was 
uninhabited, vessels put in there (Continued on page 71) 


25 











Gunmen 

Die 

Sudden 

Cassidy was old and tired now after thirty 
years of rodding the law. But he had one 
last warrant to serve—on a killer kid who 
could outdraw the fastest gun in the West! 


H is name was Cassidy but they called him Quirt for 
so long that his given name was all but forgotten, 
except by his closest friends. Cassidy was a small man, 
slightly bowed with fifty-some years. His face was cross- 
hatched by many wrinkle, faint lines such as those on 
an old china plate. There was very little about him to 
make a man look twice, except perhaps the eyes, which 
were a twenty-year-old blue and bright with a native 
sense of humor. 

He waited to board the southbound stage, and a dozen 
dignified men waited with him. They smoked expensive 
cigars and all tried to talk at once, which should have 
told anyone watching how really important they were, 
and that Cassidy was important or they wouldn’t be 

by WILL COOK 

ILLUSTRATED BY BILL GRAVELINE 


“That’s far enough, Jim. Throw down 
your gun and surrender to the law!” 



Gunmen Die Sudden 


CONTINUED 


wasting their time. There was a frequent consulting of gold- 
case watches; even Cassidy produced his as though he were 
in some kind of a hurry. 

Finally, when the stage appeared at the end of the street, 
one of the men offered his hand. 

"We’ll miss you, Quirt. That sounds tame, doesn’t it?" 

"Well,” Cassidy said, smiling gently, "I’m leaving a tame 
town.” 

The stage arrived with a squall of brakeblocks and a 
choking cloud of dust. One of the men cursed the driver 
in a good natured voice, then the door was opened and 
Quirt Cassidy stepped into the coach. His grips were thrown 
into the boot and the driver whooped his team out of town. 

The other passengers included a swan-necked circuit judge, 
a prim-expressioned housewife returning from a shopping 
trip in Dallas, and a bright-eyed young man leaning against 
the window frame. Cassidy’s glance touched him briefly, 
noticed the bulge always made by a weapon worn under the 
arm; then turned his attention to the scenery rushing by. 

Had this been the day coach from La Salle to Chicago, 
these four people would have struck up a lively conversation, 
but this was the west, and a man kept his own council, even 
in the crowded confines of a stage. From an inside coat 
pocket, Cassidy produced a day-old paper and unfolded it 
in his lap. Then he took out a pair of glasses and patiently 
adjusted them to his nose. From the fretting pats of his 
fingers a man could tell that the glasses were new. 

Cassidy read for an hour and the young man watched him 
carefully. Finally the young man said, "You’re Quirt Cas¬ 
sidy, ain’t you?” 

"Yes,” Cassidy said, not lifting his attention from the 
paper. "Here’s an interesting item. A fella in Michigan in¬ 
vented a buggy that runs by itself. He calls it a horseless 
carriage. Name’s Ford.” He placed the paper in his lap and 
looked at the young man. "And where have we met? It 
seems that I've met everyone somewhere or other." 

"You’ve never seen me before,” the young man said. "But 
I know about you.” The young man leaned back and shook 
out a sack of tobacco. While his fingers put together his 
smoke, he said, ”1 heard they retired you, Cassidy. That’s 
something—I mean, taming as many towns as you have and 
living to retire. You must be pretty good.” 

"Good at what?" Cassidy asked. He had a mild voice; it 
went along with hiS slight build and bland expression. His 
hair had once been brown, but time had placed frost on it, 
leaving his eyebrows their original shade. 


T he judge turned his head and looked at the young man 
while the housewife stared at the passing drabness; how¬ 
ever she listened with strict attention. The young man spread 
his hands. "I mean, you’ve shot it out with a few, Cassidy. 
Some pretty good men, the way I hear it. Bad, of course, 
but pretty good men.” 

"Sonny,” Cassidy said, "the line between a good man and 
a bad man is damn small. And the older you get, the more 
it narrows." 

The young man’s eyes traveled over Cassidy, then he 

28 


frowned. "You ain’t packing a gun—any that I can see.” 

"If a man’s clerking in a bank,” Cassidy said, "he puts 
down his pen and takes off his sleeve protectors when he 
goes home. I’m retired and I’m going home. A gun is a 
tool, sonny. Some men forget that and then they’re in trouble.” 

"Heard you was coming back to Dodge,” the young man 
said. "Been some years since you been there, ain’t it?” 

"Near twenty,” Cassidy admitted. "But I’ve got some 
friends there who still remember me. And I always liked 
the town, sonny. That’s important.” 

"That’s my home,” the young man said and settled back 
again. "I’ll be looking forward to gettin’ better acquainted 
with you Cassidy. We may have somethin’ in common.” 

"Most men have,” Cassidy said and went back to his 
paper. 

There was a stop that night, and at dawn the stage made 
rail connections and Cassidy settled in the smoker to enjoy 
his pipe. In the early afternoon he gathered his small satchels 
and moved toward the rear vestibule as the train sighed 
into the depot. 

H is memory of Dodge was Front Street and its hell-raising 
from dusk until dawn during the shipping season; he was 
a little surprised by the quiet, new-painted primness of the 
town. A lot bigger now, and so quiet that he could hear 
children playing in the schoolyard three blocks away. The 
young man came down the cinder platform, his boots crunch¬ 
ing. He sided Cassidy and said, "I’ll buy you one.” 

"Never touch the stuff before eight,” Cassidy said pleas¬ 
antly. He smiled and walked toward the end of the street. 
After twenty years a man does not expect to see anyone 
familiar, so when Cassidy saw Doc Ludlow, he stopped, un¬ 
able to believe his eyes. The doctor was sitting in his buggy, 
age-bent, smiling through his dense whiskers. 

"Ewing? Damn it man, you’re carrying the last twenty 
years better than I am.” 

Cassidy set his satchels down and shook hands. "Better 
stick to Quirt,” he said. "Most people have forgot about 
Ewing and I’d just as soon let ’em.” He motioned toward 
the vacant seat. "Mind?" 

"Hell no,” Doc Ludlow said. "I would have come to the 
depot, but I know how you hate a fuss.” 

Flinging his grips in back, Cassidy climbed into the rig 
and Doc Ludlow turned about in the street. ”1 don’t live 
over the express office anymore,” Ludlow said. "Got a house 
and a wife.” 

"The hell!” 

Ludlow grinned. "Three boys, too. One’s starting to law 
school this fall.” 

Quirt Cassidy leaned back in the seat and pushed his hat 
to the back of his head. Just thinking about twenty years, 
it didn't seem such a long time, but when a man talked about 
kids born and raised, it became a long time, and pretty 
much of an empty time. 

"You remember that widow, don’t you?” Doc Ludlow was 
saying. "Sure you do. Her husband was killed when the 
•Hash Knife outfit stampeded (Continued on page 51) 


ADVENTURE 



/'li all over 



MICH KCCI \K 1*1 KRRE 


■ To the ranks of filmdom’s 
beauties must now be added the 
name of Micheline Pierre, as these 
pictures reveal beyond doubt. 
Blond, curvaceous, and lithe as 
M. M., Micheline can also smile 
or pout just as fetchingly. 


29 



jtjraMmcMm 
all over 


As might be guessed from her 
name, La Pierre is very, very French, 
and relatively obscure. But she 
has already begun to make her way 
as an actress, both on the 
stage and on the screen, and 











ArcmmcMm all over 



those who saw the picture 
"Trapeze” will recognize her in¬ 
stantly, we hope. A recent visitor 
to the United States, Micheline 
has temporarily deserted us for her 
own shores, but that she’ll be back 
soon is apparent. In fact, the 
sooner the better, we say. ■ ■ 

















The Last Password 


Where did they go, silently, swiftly, these men who 
guarded the most monstrous mountain in the world? 


A s the soldiers stiffened to attention and Brigadier General Hawkins walked into the 
room, Private Donate took one look at his face and thought, now here is a tough 
boy! For the moment that General Hawkins faced the ten men before speaking to them 
they all had a sense of impact, of a force, invisible, slamming into them, making them 
lean forward alertly as if against a pressure. 

The face of General Hawkins was bleak, tanned by desert sun and his eyes were a 
merciless cold, blue ice that would not melt, ever, no matter how intense the heat of 
his isolated post. Private Tony Donate thought again, uneasily, (Continued on page 89) 


Tony said in a strangled voice, “Halt!” Then he pulled the trigger. 




HUNTING THE KING OF 


Dragons do exist today. Here are actual on-the-spot pictures to prove it! 



Attenborough hacked through virgin jungles to find Komodo Dragon, species of camiverous reptile which feeds 


F rom a very few remote areas of the globe, stories per¬ 
sistently emanate of creatures so fantastic that they seem 
almost unbelievable. One such story insists that deep in the 
heart of steaming and impassable African morasses dwells a 
giant, screaming creature that may be the last of the dino¬ 
saurs, preserved by some freak of Nature much as the pre¬ 
historic beasts in H. G. Wells’, "The Lost World” were 
preserved. Another concerns the "Abominable Snowman” 
of the high Himalayas, which some insist is a bear that 
walks erect and others insist is a man-like, creature eight 
feet tall. Still another tells of the mysterious "sasquatch” 
who dwell far above the snowline in the mountains of 


British Columbia; in some ways they are said to greatly 
resemble the Himalayan giants. 

But perhaps the weirdest of these legends deals with 
the giant, fire-breathing "dragons” reported to dwell deep 
in the jungles of Komodo Island, near the mysterious islands 
of Borneo, Java, and Bali. Ten feet long, carniverous, in¬ 
credibly powerful, the great lizards are said to be able to 
kill a man with a single lashing sweep of a homy-hided 
tail. And their existence is not fantasy, for they were first 
reported by white explorers in 1912, and have even been 
captured alive by scientists who wanted to study them in 
captivity. Zoos have wanted them too, but the few that were 
ADVENTURE 


36 



DRAGONS 

by DAVID ATTENDOROUSH 


on smaller animals. Ten-foot long, crocodile-like beast is extinct except on isolated island near Borneo and Java. 




captured did not live very long out of their native habitat. 

Why they were supposed to breathe fire was something 
of a mystery, which skeptics put down to native imagination 
and superstition. After all, legends of fire-belching dragons 
are common to quite a few lands, and might even have a 
basis in some sort of fact. 

This was the intriguing situation when two Englishmen— 
peripatetic David Attenborough and photographer Charles 
Lagus—got an unusual assignment from the British Broad¬ 
casting Company. For its TV feature, "Zoo Quest,” BBC 
wanted dramatic close-up films of the "King of Dragons,” 
as the big Komodo lizards were known. When they jaunted 


down that way again, would Attenborough and Lagus oblige? 

Attenborough and Lagus agreed with enthusiasm. They 
were, of course, after other game, both on film and in cages, 
and an early stage of the jaunt found them at Port Sama- 
rinda, Borneo, hoping to get a few orangutans alive. A 
200-mile river trip took them deep into Dyak country and 
smack onto the equator, where the heat in the shade was 
like a steam-bath and the sun blazed like an electric arc, 
where the leeches were pure misery and the leaves of the 
jungle palms were sharp as razor blades and could rip a 
man’s flesh to the bone if he made a careless movement. 

Even the Dyaks themselves were not far removed from 


MAY, 1957 


37 




Native carriers told legends of fire-breathing reptile that could kill a man with one lash of scaly tail. 


laid in clearing for bait. Photog in brush got exclusive shot of “dragon” tearing at meat. 

ADVENTURE 



HUNTING THE KING OF DRAGONS continued 


their head-hunting days, but fortunately they had no urge 
to take English heads just then, although there were reports 
from time to time that they still practiced the old pastime 
occasionally among themselves. 

The two Englishmen had plenty of interesting experiences 
among the Dyaks, including watching a medicine .man 
endeavor to "remove” the sickness from a very sick woman 
by pulling it out of her mouth. He didn’t succeed, inci¬ 
dentally; she died. Although the Dyaks were generally 
prosperous, living in well-constructed huts and garbing their 
women in richly worked dresses and silver earrings that 
stretched the earlobes to shoulder level by their sheer weight, 
they were not averse to acquiring some extra wealth. The 
Englishmen soon obtained their first orangutan—a male they 
named Charlie and hand-fed on condensed milk and well- 
sugared tea in order to gain his confidence—from an old 
Dyak in exchange for various white man’s goods and a 
liberal supply of tobacco. Other orangs soon dribbled into 
camp, and the quota was quickly filled. 

Somewhat similar visits with varying objectives were paid 
to Java and Bali; they covered about three months. Finally 
the pair arrived at Komodo, the only island in the world 
where the big lizards are found. The natives had disquieting 
news; just a few days before a man from one of the little 
villages had passed too close to one of the huge fellows in 
the dense jungle and had been knocked down by a vicious 
tailswipe and ripped to death before rescuers had time to 
arrive. It was obvious that the King of Dragons had little 
if any fear of human beings for he didn’t even bother to 
slither away as the man approached. 

Attenborough and Lagus selected an open space—a dry 
riverbed—as the site of their photography and constructed 


a stout log trap with the hope of luring a lizard inside and 
photographing him at leisure. To attract the reptiles by 
scent, they cooked up a goat and baited the trap with some 
of the meat. Not too confident of inveigling a lizard inside 
the trap, they also tied meat of the carcass of the goat to a 
rope, which was secured in turn to a stake so it couldn’t be 
dragged away. Then they sat down to wait for action, which 
was not long in coming. 

Out of the jungle and into the open crawled two of the 
giant lizards, one an enormous fellow about ten feet long 
and the other somewhat smaller. They rather resembled 
crocodiles with their long cruel jaws and stubby bow legs. 
They moved with amazing speed, looked contemptuously 
at the Englishmen, and proceeded to stage a tugging match 
for possession of the carcass of the goat. The smaller one 
was not the least bit afraid of the bigger, and between them 
they quickly ate every bit of the goat but the bones. 

It was already obvious why the huge lizards were rumored 
to breathe fire. Their angry hissing as they argued over the 
goat and their peculiar, loud sighing sounds as they gorged 
themselves resembled the sounds of steam and flames. 

Over the next twenty-five hours the two Britons kept a 
constant watch, replenishing bait as necessary and catching 
catnaps one at a time on the bare ground. They were very 
tired; the past three months had been a considerable strain 
and they had lost more than fifteen pounds apiece. 

All told, nine of the giant lizards came close enough to 
the cameras to be photographed. One was lured into the trap- 
and caged; excellent pictures were taken of him. Then he 
was set free unharmed. 

The pictures proved a sensation on "Zoo Quest” and proved 
once again that truth is often stranger than fiction. ■ ■ 



Strange hissing grunts of captured reptile as he beat against the cage walls explained fire-breathing legend. 
MAY, 1957 39 












Dorothy Martin, victim of ghastly murder. 


the case of* the 


Police found the head and torso in the first suitcase, the woman's legs 
and pelvis in the second. But they couldn’t find the chopped-ojf hands! 


by HENRY FALLON 

INTERNATIONAL NEWS PHOTOS 

I t was a matter of routine for the porter at the Long Island Railroad 
Terminal in downtown Brooklyn to check the row of lockers when he 
came on duty. They were checked every twenty-four hours, and any 
baggage left in the lockers after the lock registered a twenty-four-hour 
period had to be removed to the baggage room where the owners of 
the baggage could reclaim it by paying the overtime charges. 

The porter crinkled his nose and frowned as he removed the bags 
from locker number 216. "There's something smelly going on in this 
one,” he muttered as he placed the suitcase from 216 on his baggage cart. 
Then, without continuing his check on the rest of the lockers he shoved 
his cart directly to the office of the chief baggage attendant. 

"You better open this one,” he said, jerking his head at the suitcase 
on top of the load of baggage. "It smells to high heaven—and I don’t 
mean Chanel Five.” 

The smell had reached the nose of the chief even before the porter 
spoke. He nodded, said, "Go get a cop.” The law read that suspicious 
baggage could be opened by the terminal officials only in the presence 
of a representative of the law. 

The porter returned shortly with a policeman who was on duty in the 
terminal. The cop opened the suitcase as- the porter and the baggage 
chief stood by. All three men moved backwards instinctively as if duck¬ 
ing a blow as the top of the suitcase swung back. Their faces reflected 
the same revulsion. (Continued on page 77) 



Pasquale Donofrio shocked hard¬ 
ened police with casual confes¬ 
sion of cold-blooded madness. 


MAY, 1957 


41 


Collar of Gold 


Two men—and grinning Death—lay in that roaring 
mine fall, waiting for a little dog to find them 

by JACK DANIELS 


Crouching low on hands and knees, he spoke between clenched teeth to Lucy K, “Go home now, girl. Hurry!” 


A fter Luck K, Perry Blythe’s mongrel dog, died they hung 
her solid-gold collar behind the bar in Carson’s tavern. 
It hangs there still, as out of place now as it seemed then 
on the black and tan neck of Lucy K—except to those who 
can best understand, the men who have dug coal and have 
known the taste of fear alone in the darkness of the pits. 

Sometimes the coal pits make strange bed-fellows—men 
as different as night and day are paired by circumstance to 
work daily side by side. So it was with Perry Blythe and 
Sean Donahue, teamed ten years as loaders in Wooster Hill 
Number Seven Mine. 

Perry Blythe, the somber, wiry Welshman; the widower 

MAY, 1957 


content to putter about his garden and lovingly tend to his 
dogs and rabbits and chickens; tenor soloist each Sunday in 
the Protestant chapel. And the swaggering giant, Irish Sean 
Donahue, a bachelor, a drinker, a fighter, a fixture each night 
in Cason’s tavern but not at morning Mass come Sunday— 
yet never a day’s work missed. In graphic, profane detail 
he had shown his contempt many times for Perry’s quiet 
pleasures, irked when his baiting always failed. Either man 
could have taken a new partner, but as miners they were 
aware of their combined skills that meant bigger pay-checks 
for each and their pooled experience which was a priceless 
asset in the pinch of danger. (Continued on page 68) 


43 



The Lady Who Ate Marines 


United States Marines had more than 
men to fight in Haiti in the 1920’s. 
They had to move against human 
devils—led by a cannibal queen! 

by MATHIEU JACQUES LATOUR 


S lowly, as we watched, the dusk-golden body of Victorin the 
sorceress began to writhe and twist in a sensual mockery of 
a voodoo dance to Ogoun Badagris, the Dreaded One. 

We thought that Sargeant Lawrence Muth was dead. The leader 
of the four-man United States Marine patrol was lying motionless 
at her feet in the spot where he had fallen after being ambushed. 

He had been shot through the head and through the stomach 
with .45 rifle slugs of soft lead by a band of caco guerillas led by 
the giant, "General'' Benoit. His two (Continued on page 84) 






Ri 











The operating room of a well-managed hospital today 
is no longer a chamber of horrors. Having your ap¬ 
pendix out is no longer a painful and sometimes disas¬ 
trous affair; it is often as easy as rolling off a log! 


A re you one of those characters who hears about a'Triend going to the 
hospital for serious surgery, and thinks, "If that ever happened 
to me, I’d drop dead in the operating room”? 

You probably have the old-fashioned idea that a hospital is a chamber 
of horror, and everyone who goes in there comes out a victim of the 
tortures of the damned. Or you remember the tonsil operation you had 
as a kid, where they placed an ether mask over your yelling mouth and 
left it on until you shut up. Then there were days of very uncomfortable 
convalesence, during which you felt nobody gave a damn about you. 

If you’ve kept up with science you would know that, nowadays, having 
an operation is no more complicated than getting a deep cut in your 
finger. The onjy difference is that being hospitalized calls for more 
extensive healing procedures, and you must stay home from work for 
a while. Otherwise, jthere is very little discomfort. And a surgical 
operation today involves a staff of anywhere from fifty or more people 
all of whom are concerned with your welfare. How important can you be? 

Let’s just put you in Allan A’s place. Allan who lives in Larchmont, 
New York, has a wife, a mother and two children living with him in a 
house he bought ten years ago out of his World War II bonds and 
severance pay. If you were Allan, you’d be a conductor on one of the 
local train lines, coming home each evening tired after standing on your 
feet all day, but you’ve never been sick a day (Continued on page 83) 



by 

J. R.GAVER 


47 




The Cree’s back strained and the trapper 
rose in the air, kicking and heaving. 





The Cree named Iron Legs had been lonely, scorned and despised all his life. Now they had taken his 
woman, the only thing he loved, and for this they would pay—the bloody, horrible Indian way! 


T wo days east of Peace River, on the northern rim 
of Lesser Slave Lake, Iron Legs found fresh trail. 
He picked up the Chipewyan woman’s bear-claw neck¬ 
lace from the thawing mud and thoughtfully flaked 
away partly dry crust. For hours trail sign had become 
increasingly obvious and Iron Legs sensed that his 


quarry was in headlong flight, racing east to the prairie 
country and sacrificing trail camouflage for speed. The 
Cree hunkered down with his short legs immersed in 
mud to the ankles and considered the situation. 

The three men fleeing before him with his woman 
might be indifferent to sign (Continued on page 80) 


by JAMES MILLER 

ILLUSTRATED BY BOB SCHULZ 







ASK ADVENTURE EXPERTS 


THE ASK ADVENTURE SERVICE It fr*e, provided tell-oddrettad envelope ond full postage for reply 
are enclosed. Correspondents writing to or from foreign countries must enclose International Reply 
Coupons*, which are exchangeable for stamps of any country in the International Postal Union. Air 
mail Is quicker for foreign service. 

Send each question direct to the expert In charge of the section whose field covert It. He will reply 


ciently to guide the expert you 
lal backing, or employment. 




2M0 Mid '°- 





Prince” Alb*rt7 Snsk., &£ST 5 °' I0,h *" E " 




r TF ~ H,LBERT SCHENCK ’ JR - 







SSSS 3 

B 3 Baas?f«« 

£&£&£&**— 

i n st! 

uKToSgSaM- aTA Lan?; 






^ San 


err"wssav» 20,h and Ave - R> 

s.»;Sr LUDLOW ’ 2436 PRloma 
5 rstf,s« 7 , r n. j v. norman - 
Av^r^^n^^ 20th and 

r 

,o^ r “p«: jACKSON s ^ , ' D ' NalD * 



p - °-*■ 

Dop:. SWft 


h. W ££ STM? 

ton W r e t ac I h? d ^.- ,OHN B ‘ LEFF,N0WELL ' Braden ‘ 













GUNMEN DIE SUDDEN CONTINUED FROM PAGE 28 


through their camp." He reached over 
and slapped Cassidy with the back of his 
hand. "You ought to try married life, 
Ewing. Thickens a man’s blood.” 

They entered a quiet back street, tree 
shaded and picket-fence prim. Ludlow 
pulled up and tied his team to the antlers 
of a bronze deer. He laughed deeply and 
said, "Sent all the way to Saint Jo for 
that. Ethel wanted it.” He caught Cas¬ 
sidy’s coat sleeve, overcoming his reluc¬ 
tance. "Come on in now, damn it.” 

The house was as neat as a freshly 
laundered collar. Cool and comfortable 
and lived in. Pleasantness clung to the 
rooms like a heady perfume and Doctor 
Ludlow’s wife came from the kitchen, 
drying her hands on her apron. "Mar¬ 
shal,” she said, "we’re so glad to have 
you.” 

"Well—I thank you,” Cassidy said. "But 
I couldn’t impose.” 

"Impose?” she laughed, as though this 
were too ridiculous to consider seriously. 
"I’ve waited twenty years to do something 
for you,” she said. "Now you’ll have to 
excuse me. I have pies in the oven.” She 
turned back toward the kitchen, then 
stopped. "Max, why don’t ybu take the 
marshal up town.” 

Max Ludlow wiped a hand across his 
mouth, anticipating the taste of a glass 
of beer. "Good idea,” he said and they 

While they walked, Cassidy said, "I’ll 
find a place in a few days. Max.” 

"There’s no hurry,” Ludlow said. "I’m 
not just saying that.” 

"Sure, sure. But I’m a loner. Max. 
It’ll take me awhile to get used to living 
close to people.” Now that he had said 
it, he realized that as a lawman, he had 
never enjoyed a normal life. Surrounded 
by people, and constantly mingling with 
them, he had never really got close to 
anyone. Not close like a butcher or a bank 
teller, or even the town loafer. A marshall 
was sort of like an actor, always on stage, 
always acting out a role, and Cassidy 
decided that this was what got a man 
after awhile. 


The saloon was full of those pleasant 
" flavors that men find so relaxing. Cigar 
smoke hung close to the ceiling and the 
dozen men lounging near the bar talked 
with a freedom they did not exercise at 
home. 

Ludlow signaled the bartender, then 
turned his head to see who was in the 
room. In the back bar mirror, Cassidy 
saw the young man who had been with 
him on the train. He stood between two 
other men and the stamp of common 
parenthood was on all three. 

When the beer arrived. Max Ludlow 
said, "May this be the first of a million, 
Ewing. You earned every damn one of 
them,” Ludlow said. 

The young man down the bar eased 
away and came up on Cassidy’s right. 
He placed his hands flat and said, "I 
thought you never took a drink before 
eight, Cassidy?” 

MAY, 1957 


"With strangers,” Cassidy said evenly. 

"Hell, I ain’t a stranger. We came in 
on the same train.” 

"So did the brakie and conductor,” 
Cassidy said, "but they’re still strangers.” 

The young man frowned momentarily, 
then looked at Max Ludlow. "Introduce 
me. Doc.” 

"Your mouth is big enough,” Ludlow 
said. "Introduce yourself.” 


A n angry stain came into the young 
man’s cheeks,^ but he controlled it 
well. "I’m Jim Kenyon. That name mean 
anything to you, Cassidy?” He looked 
down the bar. 'Those are my brothers, 
Rob and Barr.” 

"I remember a Kenyon. In the Indian 
country. Some twenty years ago.” 

"That was Pa,” Jim Kenyon said. 
"None of us ever believed you when you 
said he put up a fight, Cassidy.” 

This was as close as any man- could 
come to calling another a liar without 
spelling it out, yet Quirt Cassidy’s ex¬ 
pression did not change. 

His voice remained as mild as a glass 
of warm milk. "Whether you believe it 
or not isn’t very important, Jim. When a 
man is twenty years dead, it’s high time 
folks forget him and go on living.” 

"Now don’t get preachy with me,” 
Jim Kenyon said. 

"Suppose you tell me what you want,” 
Cassidy said. "A fight?” He smiled and 
shook his head. "I’m past that, sonny.” 

"Why don’t you go and mind your 
business?” Max Ludlow asked. He turned 
and looked at Bob and Barr Kenyon. 
"You sic him up to this?” 

"He’s voting age,” Barr Kenyon said. 
"I’ll just watch.” 

Ludlow made a disgusted noise with 
his mouth and turned back to face Jim 
Kenyon. The young man was leaning on 
the bar, his attention on Cassidy. "So 
you’re going to stay in Dodge.” 

T thought I would,” Cassidy said. 
"You’re not going to suggest that the 
town isn’t big enough for both of us, are 

"Nawww!” Jim Kenyon said. "But 
you’re not going to like it here. I just 
know you ain’t.” He nodded toward his 
brothers and walked out; they trailed him 
a few paces behind. 

Doctor Ludlow was full of confused 
apology. "Damn it, Ewing, I’m sorry 
about that. I didn’t know he’d shoot off 
his mouth like . . .” 

"Every man shoots off his mouth,” 
Cassidy said. "Have another beer. Max.” 
He signaled the bartender, then turned 
as the front door opened and a man 
stepped inside. Cassidy saw the badge 
first. 

“Evening, Doc,” the marshal said. He 
glanced at Cassidy and smiled. "My 
name’s Richter.” 

They shook hands. Richter was a tall, 
blunt-boned man in his early thirties. 
His hands and feet were large, which 
might have accounted for a certain clum¬ 
siness in his manner. 

51 




First Two Stoyies Bring $255 

"Btfor* I completed the course I 
sold two stories. One for $110 and 
the other for $145. When the going 
got toujhj just turned to thejes- 


WANTED: 

More Writers 

For Magazines, TV Journals 

Would you be willing to spend 


earn 1500 to 
thousands on 


Earn While Learning—At Home 

Many Palmer beginners earn' while learning, r 
ceiving small but welcome checks for material th 
may be turned o 
proper technique. 

unique method of 


lh 


jut for all: Fiction, Article, Radio-TV. Palmer 
Institute’s home-study training is endorsed by fa¬ 
mous authors—including Rupert Hughes, Gertrude 
Atherton, Ruth Comfort Mitchell, Katharine New- 
lin Burt. Keith Monroe, and by hundreds of suc¬ 
cessful graduates. 

First Story Sells for $240 

"My first story sold to Modern Romances for 
$240, thanks to Palmer Institute. Being professional 
writers, your instructors understand a beginner’s 
problems. Their written comments are balm to the 
wound of being an unpublished writer. Then, juesto! 

F^Wendero’th, Atlantic City, N. J. 

$1400 from Outdoor Life 

"Sold an article on hunting to Outdoor Life for 
1. plus two stories 


lable I ever spent.”— Ray Beck, Knox, Pa, 

lent Sells Six Stories 

For several years I’d been writing rather hap¬ 
hazardly and gotten only printed, mechanical rejec¬ 
tion slips. I started taking the Palmer course about 
a half year ago, and during recent months, have sold 
six stories to leading science fiction magazines. That 
doesn’t make me rich or famous, but it does make 

Palmer and bigger and better sales.”— Chat E, 
Fritch, Utica, New York. 

FREE Lesson Shows How 

So you can see for yourself how you may "cash- 


udy course, wit! 
jual writing, assi 


ke this offer because we i 


please. Send 

for your Free Lesson Package and inspiring 40-page 
Book-^No obligation. No salesman will call. Send 

Palmer Institute of Authorship 

; credited: National Home Study Council 











He shook his head and indicated the 
street with a thumb motion. "Trouble 
with the Kenyon boys is that they’re not 
civilized. Still carry guns and act like 
it was eighteen eighty.” He frowned 
slightly. "I don’t suppose you’ll recall it, 
but the Kenyon boys’ father was ...” 

"I remember him vividly,” Cassidy said 
softly. 

Marshal Richter was surprised. He 
glanced quickly at Max Ludlow, then 
said, "Man, that was a long time ago.” 

Quirt Cassidy swirled his glass of beer 
and watched suds collect on the glass. 
"Mr. Richter, I may have arrested a thou¬ 
sand men in my time; I never counted 
and I don’t remember them at all.” He 
turned his head slowly and looked at the 
marshal. "But those times, when a man 
insisted on coming back the hard way, I 
recall clearly. Have you ever killed a man, 
Mr. Richter?” 

There was a moment of complete si¬ 
lence, while every man in the room lis¬ 
tened and while Marshal Richter pre¬ 
pared his answer. "I’ve never had occa¬ 
sion, sir.” He licked his lips as though 
he thought he ought to apologize. "The 
town’s pretty quiet now. The bad ones 
are gone, Mr. Cassidy.” 

"Gone?” Cassidy turned and leaned 
his elbow on the bar, his wrinkled hands 
gently folded. "Where did they go, Mr. 
Richter?” 

"Why—I guess men like you just chased 
them out of the country, sir.” 

Cassidy smiled and every wrinkle in his 
face functioned. His laugh was soft. "Ah, 
you know how to flatter a man, Mr. 
Richter, but the credit is not mine. And 
the bad in a man was never driven out. 
Driven into hiding, perhaps, but not elim¬ 
inated.” He picked up his beer glass and 
drained it. "It’s been pleasant meeting you 
Mr. Richter. Perhaps we can talk again.” 


Cassidy walked to the door while Lud¬ 
low tossed a quarter on the bar. While 
Cassidy paused, waiting for Ludlow to 
come up, Marshall Richter said, "I keep 
this town pretty quiet and if the Kenyons 
start anything. I’ll lock them up until 
they cool off.” 

"Appreciate that,” Cassidy said, "but 
I don’t think there’ll be any need for 
that. Been handling my own troubles for 
so long now that it’s become a habit.” 

"Yes, sir,” Richter said, and Cassidy 
stepped out to the walk. 

Doc Ludlow produced two cigars, of¬ 
fering-one to Cassidy, along with a match. 
"Hell of a thing to have happen on a 
man’s first day,” Ludlow said. 

"Do'you think it hasn’t happened be¬ 
fore?” Cassidy asked gently. 

Ludlow grunted. "Suppose it has. What 
do you do about it, Ewing?” 

"Nothing,” Cassidy said. He sniffed 
the cigar. "Havana, isn’t it? A far cry 
from those Moonshine Crooks you used 
to smoke.” lie turned and started to walk 
along the street. The charcoal shadows of 
evening were thickening in the street and 
the street lights came on, spreading pud¬ 
dles of light at even intervals. At the 
corner, the three Kenyon boys sat their 
horses, and as Cassidy and Ludlow ap¬ 
proached, Barr Kenyon spurred forward 
until his horse was standing crossways 
on the walk. 

Ludlow took the cigar from his mouth 
and spoke in an irritated voice. "Damn 
you, Barr, none of this nonsense now.” 

"Keep out of this,” Kenyon said. "Jim.” 
That one word brought Jim Kenyon into 
the play. He started pushing Ludlow back 
by racking his horse. When Ludlow was 
against the feedstore wall, Jim Kenyon 
held him there, the horse’s shoulder lightly 
against Ludlow. 

Barr Kenyon looked down from his 


mounted height and said, "I want to use 
the walk, Cassidy.” 

"Use it then, Cassidy invited. 

Several men came out of the feedstore 
and watched, while more edged in from 
up the street. Trouble has a silent call that 
travels on the wind, and that call went 
through Dodge. 

"My horse is funny in his habits,” Barr 
Kenyon said pleasantly. "He only likes 
the walk when he sees you on it.” The 
pleasantness left his face quickly. "Get 
off!” 

"God damn. . . .” This from Ludlow. 

"All right,” Cassidy said, and stepped 
into the street. 


A quick surprise came into Barr Ken¬ 
yon’s face. Then he laughed. "I 
thought you were tough,” he said. 

Quirt Cassidy looked at him. "Where 
did you hear that?” He motioned toward 
the walk. "You got it all to yourself. Use 
it.” He turned then and started across 
the street, but stopped when Rob Kenyon 
turned his horse and walked straight for 
him. For a moment it seemed that Rob 
would walk Cassidy down, then the old 
man stepped aside. 

Rob Kenypn stopped and looked down. 
"Old man, my horse likes the street. 
Horses are funny. Now Barr’s, he likes 
the sidewalk. The way I look at it, it’s 
going to be a little risky for you to walk 
around Dodge. You might get run down 
easy as hell.” 

"That possibility occurred to me,” Quirt 
Cassidy said. He looked at the crowd 
watching so expectantly. He wondered 
what they expected him to do, pull a gun 
and pistol-whip the Kenyons? He drew 
gently on his cigar, then added, "I might 
have to buy me a buggy.” 

He waited with the patience so common 
among the elderly, and finally Rob eased 
his horse-away from Max Ludlow, and 
Barr Kenyon vacated the sidewalk. They 
gathered in the street and Barr Kenyon 
said, "We’ll see you again, Cassidy.” 

With a whoop they charged down the 
street and turned the far corner. Ludlow 
came up, adjusting his coat and his an¬ 
ger. "God damn hellions. I’ll swear out 
a complaint.” His glance touched Quirt 
Cassidy. "Damn it, I didn’t think you’d 
take that.” 

"What did you want me to do, Max?” 
Ludlow opened his mouth, then 
clamped his jaws on his cigars. "Let’s 
go home,” he said. "I never liked making 
a spectacle of myself on the street.” 

He was angry and trying not to be and 
did not speak while they walked the 
length of the back street. On the porch, 
Cassidy said, "I’ve disappointed you. 
Max.” 

"Oh, hell, it isn’t that. What right do 
I have to be disappointed anyway?” He 
put his hand on Cassidy’s shoulder, urg¬ 
ing him inside. "Come on, Ethel will 
have supper ready.” 

The youngest of Ludlow’s sons was 
ten and as full of questions as a revenue 
officer making his first trip to Tennessee. 
Max tried to silence the boy, but Cassidy 
seemed to enjoy the questions, for they 
concerned the living legends that had 



52 


ADVENTURE 






been a part of Quirt Cassidy’s life. Was 
Wyatt Earp really fast on the draw? Did 
Mr. Cassidy really outdraw John Wesley 
Hardin? 

Then the boy filled his mouth with 
mashed potatoes; he could talk around 
food without effort. "Mr. Cassidy, you’re 
not scared of the Kenyons, are you?” 

"No,” Cassidy said, "I’m not afraid 
of the Kenyons.” 

"Then why didn’t you hit that Barr?” 

Cassidy paused a moment. "Son, how 
did you hear about_ this? It only hap¬ 
pened a half hour ago.” 

"Billy Haskell told me. He said his pa 
seen it. You just stood there and let ’em 
walk all over you.” 

"What would you have done. Tad?” 

"Gee, I don’t know. Somethin’ any¬ 
way.” 

"Yes,” Cassidy said. "I expect I should 
have done something.”, 

"Then why didn’t you?” 

"Son, if you could run real fast, and 
had to do it for twenty years, how would 
you feel?” 

"Gosh, tired, I guess.” 

"I’m tired," Cassidy said. He reached 
across the table and took one of the boy’s 
smooth hands in his own. "Look at the 
difference, son. You see those lines? 
There's one for every year I’ve lived. And 
those fingers, they used to be quick and 
limber like your own, but now they’re 
stiff and the joints hurt when the weather 
fixes to change.” He pulled his hand 
back. "My head’s been learning things for 
many years, but what is the learning if 
a man’s body won’t do what his head 
asks? You think I could beat Jim Ken¬ 
yon to the draw now. Tad?” 

"No—no, sir.” The boy seemed su¬ 
premely disappointed that an indestruc¬ 
tible hero could admit having the scars of 
a mortal man. "I—I guess you couldn’t 
do anything else but take it,” Tad said, 
then suddenly fled the table. 


pthel Ludlow started to rise, but her 
“ husband put out his hand and held 
her there. "Let the boy alone. He has to 
be alone now.” 

"Yes,” she said, "but it’s always so 
hard to lose a dream.:' 

"The boy will understand in time,” 
Quirt Cassidy said. "He’lKhave to under¬ 
stand how a man can not be afraid, and 
still be unable to act.” 

"God damn the Kenyons anyway,” Max 
Ludlow said. "Walt until the next one 
comes to me with a bellyache. By George, 
I’ll give him a physic that’ll . . 

"You’ll give him a pill to make the 
bellyache go away,” Cassidy said, rising. 
"You’re that kind. Max.” 

"Maybe after you’re around for a few 
weeks, the Kenyon boys will get tired 
and . . 

Cassidy smiled. "You know men better 
than that. Max. That grudge is twenty 
years old. When they last that long, they’re 
hard to put aside.” He pursed his lips 
and his eyes turned thoughtful. "Times 
have changed. Max. Fifteen years ago 
I’d have had a shoot-out there on the 
street, and I’d have lost. Now the law’s 
too strong for that. They’ll find other 


MAY, 1957 



53 


































































SLOT- 

MACHINE 

DIVORCE 

by Steve Libby 

Getting married was easy in the 
days of the old West. And in the 
notorious frontier town of Cor- 
inne, Utah, divorce was even easier. 

In 1869 the coming of the over¬ 
land railroad put Corinne in full¬ 
blown readiness to meet all emer¬ 
gencies. Amid daily scenes of gam¬ 
bling, drunkeness and sin, a pair of 
self-labelled attorneys conceived a 
plan for "slot-machine divorces,” 
and inserted an interesting adver¬ 
tisement in the local newspaper: 

Divorces Secured 
Presence Not Necessary 
Fee $2.50 

Johnson & Underdunk 
Lawyers 
Corinne, Utah 

According to old-timers, the pro¬ 
cedure for getting one of these in¬ 
expensive and painless divorces was 
the model of simplicity. The 
divorce-seeker merely slipped a 
$2.50 gold piece into the machine, 
turned a crank, and out came the 
divorce papers, signed by a local 
judge. It wasn’t even necessary to 
be there in person—a friend could 
do the trick. 

The question of alimony involved 
a slight .complication. There was a 
blank space in the document for 
inserting the proper amount. 

As may be imagined, the divorce 
machine was a mighty popular de¬ 
vice for some time. Attorneys John¬ 
son and Underdunk did right well 
—until statutes failed to back up 
the decrees and many persons 
found themselves involved in an 
interesting state of bigamy. • • • 


ways to work on me.” His smile came 
back; it never seemed far away. "I’ve 
put up with this all my life, Max. If 
one man wasn’t after me, another was. 
Part of the game, I guess. Thanks for the 
supper,” Cassidy said and went out. 


The night was cool and as he walked 
* toward the center of town he could not 
help but think how it had changed. The 
Dodge he had known was one strip of 
hell. Front Street, running east and west 
just north of the Santa Fe tracks, with 
most of the wildness confined between 
Bridge Street and the Arkansas River toll 
bridge. Gone now were the men of Dodge, 
and with them went the places he had 
known: The Dodge House, Deacon Cox’ 
hotel two blocks east of Bridge Street, 
Beebe's Iowa Hotel at Third and Front. 
He stopped and in his mihd came all 
those sounds of a day long dead, and for 
a moment he was young again, heavy 
with guns, walking the middle of the 
street while around him moved all the 
emotions man contains. There was the 
Long Branch, bright with light, packed 
with sound, and Luke Short dealing faro 
with his expressionless, moon face and 
derby cocked rakishly. Down the street, 
A1 Webster’s Alamo Saloon held a ca¬ 
pacity crowd; he boasted that his doors 
never closed. Dog Kelly had the Alham¬ 
bra and if a man stopped to listen, he 
could hear Dora Hand singing in the 
Dodge City Opera House. 

The Dodge of 1874 changed, and was 
replaced by the new Dodge, with chil¬ 
dren playing Tar Baby and Andy Over 
where the old Plaza used to be. Ladies 
now moved along toward the Episcopal 
Church for the Wednesday night prayer 
meeting, their long skirts brushing a spot 
where a man’s blood had darkened the 
plank walk, while the winner was toasted 
in The Alamo. 

Quirt Cassidy started walking again, 
the past retreating to the shadowed re¬ 
cesses of his mind. He stopped along Front 
Street and found a saddlemaker in the 
building that had been his marshal’s office; 
the new marshal’s office and jail was two 
blocks down, a brick building with tele¬ 
phone wires leading into it. Cassidy 
opened the door and stepped inside. Mar¬ 
shal Richter was eating his supper. He 
stood up and said, "Have a seat. All I 
got left is my coffee apd that’s too hot.” 

”1 don’t want to interrupt you,” Cassidy 
said. 

"You’re not.” Richter rolled a cigarette 
then leaned back in his chair. "I expect 
you’ll want to swear out a warrant for 
the Kenyons.” He smiled. "It’s against the 
city ordinance to ride a horse or drive a 
vehicle on the sidewalk.” 

Richter’s phrasing told Cassidy just 
where he stood, then he chided himself for 
being sensitive. "I don’t want to com¬ 
plain,” Cassidy said. "I just stopped in to 
talk shop.” He studied his gnarled finger¬ 
nails a moment. "The Kenyons are going 
to stir some old ashes, Mr. Richter. I 
just want you to understand who’s doing 
the stirring.” 

"I know the Kenyons,” Richter said. 
"I’ve had Barr in jail twice for fist fight¬ 


ing. Jim’s the one to watch. He’s pretty 
good with a short gun. Buys four or five 
boxes of shells a month. I guess he thinks 
he’s Doc Holliday or something.” 

"You’ve left out Rob,” Cassidy said. 

”1 hope Rob stays out of this,” Richter 
said. "There’s some hope for him if the 
other two will stop pushing him.” Richter 
got up and walked to the window to 
stand. 

"Mr. Cassidy, I don’t like to say this, 
but you made a pretty poor showing out 
there. As a famous lawman, you know 
that once you give a man an inch, he’ll 
take a mile, and walk all over you while 

"Is this your opinion—that I made a 
poor showing—or the town’s?" 

Richter did not like to be forced into 
a corner. He said, "I’d say the feeling 
was pretty general.” He came back to his 
desk and sat on the corner. "Let me put 
it this way, Mr. Cassidy. Years ago you 
were the marshal here, and I understand, 
a damned good oqe. Some of the old tim¬ 
ers are still around and they’ve been 
talking about you, and the old days. This 
new generation, like me, we judge the 
past, and its men, by what we hear. Then 
when a legend comes back, and he don’t 
measure up, well, it sort of makes a liar 
out of a lot of men.” 

”1 see,” Cassidy said. 

"Sure, but what are you going to do 
about it?” 

"What do you want me to do? Put 
on a gun and brace the Kenyons where 
the town can see it?” 

"No, no,” Richter said. He mopped a 
hand across his mouth. ”1 don’t know 
what the hell to tell you, Mr. Cassidy.” 

Cassidy laughed. "Mr. Richter, you’re 
taking life too seriously.” He stood up 
and walked to the door. "Perhaps I will 
have to do something about the Kenyons, 
just for the sake of my reputation.” His 
face wrinkled into another smile, then he 
stepped outside. There the smile faded, 
leaving Cassidy’s seamed face troubled. 
The trouble with a man, he decided, was 
that after a lifetime of living in the 
public eye, his pride became his worst 
enemy. Retirement was one thing, but 
retiring the pride was another. 

He turned toward the main street and 
when he came to the saloon, he turned in. 
Habit, he supposed. A lot of his business 
had been conducted in saloons, either 
cleaning one out, or going in after a mam 


IJlfhen he stepped inside, and saw Barr 
® * Kenyon leaning against the far ell, 
Cassidy realized that his habits had once 
more tripped him. Still, he was inside, and 
blamed if he wpuld turn around and 

He wiggled his finger for service, and 
got it quick enough. Barr Kenyon picked 
up his beer and walked around to where 
Cassidy stood. Cassidy stood like a patient 
horse, his wrinkled face composed. When 
Barr Kenyon edged in, Cassidy turned, 
and casually spilled his glass of beer on 
Kenyon’s arm. 

"Oh! Now I’m sure sorry there,” Cas¬ 
sidy said. 

Every man in the room watched, but 

ADVENTURE 



few understood exactly what Quirt Cas¬ 
sidy was doing. He did not expect that 
they would for his action was the sum 
total of twenty years of law enforcement. 
When Barr cursed and cocked his body to 
swing, Cassidy merely stepped forward 
and threw his shoulder against Kenyon’s 
chest, pinning him against the bar. Cassidy 
stepped on Barr’s feet, making him howl, 
then he caught Barr by the coat sleeve 
and jerked him forward. Only Cassidy 
forgot to take his feet from in front of 
Kenyon, which tripped him so that he fell 
full length. 


TPo those watching, it seemed that Quirt 
■ Cassidy was just a clumsy man mak¬ 
ing a bad job of a poor wrestling match. 
Kenyon was confused and very angry. 
His cursing was a dull nimble in his 
throat. 

"I’ll help you up there,” Cassidy said 
and grabbed Barr’s collar. When he lifted, 
he nearly choked Kenyon. Cassidy seemed 
blissfully unaware of the discomfort his 
grip caused Kenyon; that man’s eyes 
bulged and his hands tore at his collar, 
trying to free the restricting cloth. Cassidy 
opened the front door with his foot, 
brought Barr Kenyon to the porch rail, 
, and there dumped him into the street. 

The crowd had followed them out and 
now rocked with laughter while Barr 
crouched on his hands and knees. 

"If I was you,” Cassidy said evenly, 
"I'd teach that horse of yours not to ride 
on the sidewalk.” His voice was softly 
conversational, like he was telling two 
lovers not to sit on the park grass. 

Barr looked up and said, "You foxy old 
goat.” 

"Taught you something, didn’t I? Be 
smart now and take the lesson to heart.” 

"What the hell happened, Barr?” one 
of the men asked. "Couldn’t you whip 
the old man?” 

Laughter rippled back and forth across 
the porch. Quirt Cassidy said, "I’ll stand 
a round of drinks inside. 1 ’ 

That never failed to turn them. When 
the last man stepped inside, Cassidy spoke 
to Barr Kenyon, who was standing there, 
brushing dust from his clothes. "I'm a 
peaceful man, sonny, and I went through 
the motions of retiring. Now don’t spoil 
it for me and make me slap your hands.” 
He turned then and went inside. 

Surrounded by laughing men, Cassidy 
wondered if he shouldn’t tell them the 
truth about the scuffle. After all, a man 
who has thrown toughs out of saloons 
for twenty years, develops some kind of 
a technique. Then he decided that it would 
be unfair to take the shine out of their 
evening. It didn’t really matter what they 
thought, as long as Barr got the point, 
and Cassidy was certain that the young 
man did. He had seen Barr’s eyes there 
in the street; the insolence had somehow 
fled, and was replaced by the knowledge 
that Quirt Cassidy was not an easy man 
to walk over. i 

After a reasonable time, Cassidy ex¬ 
cused himself and walked back toward 
Doctor Max Ludlow’s house. He decided 
that the locusts sang a little sweeter now, 
and the only regret he had was that Tad 


MAY, 1957 



fKt PRODUCER'S SELECTION! ' 

|«y^V“ 3 ', , a r S i ; A “ r "“ • ■' 

oreathtalcinq, professionniii# ± producers. These • * * 
'"any of Hollywood’s top *j’* f ? a . ture ' 

"on the way Ip." NowX ,pedal when - • 

authentic arrangement, . 


..ices. Save up to 50%on Nev 

THIS $7.50 UALUE Gim ^ 
8m HaX° N * ™ 1* PROJE CTOr1 
m SL0W or STOP MOTION " 



'iSZ&mS!**** 

.t xSKCPKOPVCTIOHS 

. 


NOW! tOO Br 

' SSS 1 S and s d h ; do ' 

J. yt art poses of » 
photograph- M °" ey 
I ORDER NOW! SUPP^ UMITED 

Reg. $3-5° Value ° n y _ 


.. too different 

le body availabl' 


ART STUDY AIDS 

P.O. BOX 1095, BURBANK 33 CALIFORNIA 


EXCITING NEWS! 


1 RlR 8 0R 

no 

I DIU FILM only v| # 

UllPPl 


Now —the most SENSATIONAL offer ever made 
to home movie fans and film collectors. We’ll 
'•—' you a sparkling, exciting film—with Holly- 
Is loveliest showgirls and models—for less » 

—— - -OSt! Just SDeClfv 8 or I Amm anaL.A I Art 

(No C.O.D.'s 


send \ 

wood's _ .„ v „ s ,.BBL_ _ 

c ° s *l s P ecif y 8 or ,6mm . enclose $1.00. 
...o C.O.D.'s please.) If you don't agree film is 
worth 5 times the price, just send it back for 
prompt, full refund. 


Order now •offer limited! 



Jailor* 


55 












hadn’t been there. The young man’s opin¬ 
ion was important to Cassidy, but then 
he supposed that most old people thought 
that way. When they had nothing else, 
the respect of the young loomed large in 
their life. 


CHAPTER II 

DOCTOR Max Ludlow and his wife 
were sitting on the porch when Quirt 
Cassidy came up the walk. Cassidy 
stopped when he saw someone else sit¬ 
ting in the shadows. 

"I’d like you to meet Bess Avery,” 
Ludlow said. 

Cassidy removed his hat as the girl 
stood up. "Could I talk to you, Mr. Cas¬ 
sidy?” She moved into the bath of lamp¬ 
light streaming through the front win¬ 
dow. Cassidy judged her to be in her 
early twenties, an uncommonly pretty 
woman with dark hair and large, serious 
eyes. 

"My pleasure,” he said and held open 
the screen door. They went into the parlor 
and there Bess stood uncertainly. Her fin¬ 
gers plaited a handkerchief while Cassidy 
turned to the mantle and one of Max 
Ludlow’s Havanas. "Which of the Ken¬ 
yon boys do you like?” Cassidy asked 
easily. 

"Why, Ba . . . How did you know?” 

Quirt Cassidy rubbed the back of his 
neck and gave her his soft smile. "I’m 
a little old to have a young, pretty wo¬ 
man call on my account. And since the 
Kenyons are the only young folks I’ve 
had a chance to meet in Dodge, why I 
just figured . . .” 

"You figured right,” Bess Avery said. 
"Won’t you sit down, Mr. Cassidy.” She 
took a chair across from him and folded 
her hands in her lap. "I don’t really know 
how to begin. Barr would be angry if he 
knew I was here.” 

"It seems to me that Barr is angry about 
a lot of things." Cassidy studied the per¬ 
fect ash on his cigar. r The Kenyons want 
to get even. Miss Avery. Don’t blame 
them for that. I remember them. Barr 
was five at the time. Jim—I think he was 
the youngest—was just beginning to walk. 
The mother was dead. After their father 
was killed, they stayed with a sister here 
in Dodge.” 

Bess Avery leaned slightly forward. 
"Mr. Cassidy, what kind of a man was 
their father?" 

"You think you’ll get some insight 
into the Son that way?” He shook his 
head. "Birth is just an event. It’s how a 
man lives that determines what he is.” 

"You’re not answering me.” 

"Maybe I'm trying to duck the ques¬ 
tion," Cassidy said. "Pete Kenyon was a 
little wild. Not a care in the world. He 
had a lot of jobs and quit often. Never 
could stick to anything very long. As long 
as the game was played by his rules, it 
was all right, but when he had to obey 
someone else’s rule, he’d quit. Pete had 
an argument with Anse Pruett — you 
wouldn’t remember him, before your time. 
Anse wouldn’t give Pete his pay so Pete 
took one of the old man’s roans. Anse 
swore out a warrant and I went to serve 
it. I knew Pete and expected trouble. 


Found him all right, but the damned fool 
pulled a gun and started shooting on a 
crowded street. One woman got nicked, 
so I killed him.” 

“The boys loved their father.” 

Cassidy sighed and got up, moving rest¬ 
lessly about the room. "Miss Avery, chil¬ 
dren will love anyone who laughs and 
daddies them on their knee. Do you think 
they evaluate right and wrong? The Ken¬ 
yons are living with that memory.” He 
came back and sat down. "What is it you 
want me to do?” 

"I—I don’t want you to shoot them,’’ 
she said. 

"Shoot them?” 

"You’re a famous man, Mr. Cassidy. 
Everyone knows about you. Father says 
that you were faster than Wyatt Earp.” 
She reached out as if to touch Cassidy, 
then drew back her hand. "Please, Mr. 
Cassidy, I love Barr Kenyon.” 

He could no longer sit there and watch 
her; he got up again. What could he say 
to her, he wondered. Then he stopped 
pacing and looked at the back of her 
head. She believed the Kenyon boys! That 
was it. She believed that he had been little 
more than an authorized gunman and that 
the shooting of Pete Kenyon had been a 
whim, not a necessity. The thought jarred 
Quirt Cassidy badly and he wondered 
how many others thought of him in that 
way. 

"You go on and don’t worry about it,” 
he said. "I don’t want trouble with any- 

She did not believe him; her quick, 
questioning glance told him that, but she 
went out. Cassidy walked to the porch 
with her, and when she turned at the 
front gate, he sat down between Doctor 
Ludlow and his wife. 

"The window was open,” Max Ludlow 
said. "Couldn’t help but overhear.” 

Cassidy took a final drag on the cigar 
and shied it onto the lawn. "She made 
me see something I never saw before,” 
Cassidy said. "Not a pretty thing either.” 

"Jsfow dcfn’t start building things in 
your mind,” Ludlow said. "Ethel, is there 
any coffee on the stove?” She went inside 
and when the door closed, Ludlow said, 
"A man would think marshalin’ was just 
a job, like store clerkin’, or running a 
saloon. When it came time for a man to 
go to pasture, he just lays down his tools 
and goes through a gate. But I guess it’s 
different with you, Ewing. You quit all 
right, but no one else quits remembering.” 

"I was never a killer,” Cassidy said. 
"Yes, I killed, when there was no other 
choice.” 

"Folks know that,” Ludlow said. 

"Do they?” 

"Yes they do,” Ludlow said. His wife 
came out with a tray. She placed it on 
the porch railing and poured. 


C assidy cradled his cup in’ his hands 
and after a moment, said, "Maybe 
it would be a good idea if I went some¬ 
where else, Max. California, maybe. Wyatt 
Earp did. Masterson went east. Maybe 
it’s a mistake for a man to retire in a 
place where he’s worked. 

"Now you’re talking like an old fool,” 


Ethel Ludlow said. "If a man can’t live 
where he chooses, then he’s better off 
under the ground.” 

Max Ludlow winked at Quirt Cassidy, 
and a grin grew on the old man’s face. 

"Dodge it is then,” Cassidy said and 
drank his coffee. 


D octor Ludlow had early morning 
calls to make and after he drove 
down the street in his buggy. Quirt Cas¬ 
sidy walked Tad to the school house. 

The boy was not interested in talk and 
Cassidy surmised that the only reason the 
boy just didn’t run off was because he 
obeyed his parents. 

At the school house corner Cassidy said 
goodbye and noticed how relieved Tad 
seemed. He. watched the boy for a time, 
then turned toward the main street. 

Marshal Richter was coming out of the 
restaurant, a toothpick busily exploring 
the crevasses between his teeth. He saw 
Cassidy and lifted a hand. "Wait up 
there.” Cassidy stopped and Richter came 
across the street. "Mr. Cassidy, I heard 
about the affair you had last night. Can’t 
say that I approve.” 

"Well,” Cassidy said softly, "there 
wasn’t time to consult you.” 

Richter’s face took on color. "What I 
meant was, you were lucky. Next time 
might be different.” 

"You got a point there,” Cassidy said. 
He chuckled and his eyes pulled down to 
wrinkled puckers. "Lucky, huh? That’s 
the way you got it figured?" 

"Hell,” Richter said, "you’re pinning 
me down. I wasn’t figuring it anyway. I 
got a buggy, so what do you say we go 
on out to the Kenyon place and settle 
this amicably before it turns into some¬ 
thing serious.” 

"All right,” Cassidy said, quite agree¬ 
ably. "But I’m not so blamed old I can’t 
sit a horse.” 

"My horse is at the stable,” Richter 
said. "I can get one for you .there.” 

They walked to the end of the street 
and Cassidy waited while Richter had 
two horses saddled. He studied an old, 
leaning building sitting lonely and unoc¬ 
cupied to one side of the lot. When Rich¬ 
ter came out, leading the horses, Cassidy 
said, "I thought the old place would have 
fallen down by now. It was in seventy- 
five that I shot it out with Texas Jack 
Kennedy in that stable. I remember be¬ 
cause Wyatt Earp came to Dodge the 
next day.” Cassidy laughed softly. "People 
were so blamed excited to get a look at 
Earp that they plumb forgot to bury 
Kennedy. I had to dig the grave myself." 

"The city fathers want to tear it down,” 
Richter said, mounting. "It’s an eyesore.” 

"Yes,” Cassidy admitted, with some re¬ 
luctance. ”1 guess it is, now.” He stepped 
into the saddle and followed Richter out 
of town. They took the old fort road and 
Cassidy studied the surrounding land as 
they rode along. When they came to a 
faint slash, almost completely brush 
choked now, he pointed. "That used to 
be the quickest way into the Ogallala 
country. When a man was on the dodge 
and wanted to get out quick, he’d take 
that trail.” 


56 


ADVENTURE 


The Kenyon place was backed against 
a small creek whose banks showed clearly 
the fluctuating seasons of flood and 
drought. As they rode into the yard, Barr 
Kenyon stepped out, letting the jcreen 
door bang shut. Jim came from the barn, 
as did Rob; he had been mending a saddle 
and put it aside to walk across the yard 
with his brother. 

Marshal Richter crossed his hands on 
the saddlehorn and said, "Gentlemen, I 
think it’s time we had a talk.” 

"What do you want to talk about?” 
Rob Kenyon asked. He was a big man, 
angular-faced, with boxy shoulders an ax 
handle wide. The three men seemed 
friendly enough but Cassidy recognized 
the antagonism hidden beneath the sur¬ 
face of their manners. 

"Mr. Richter, I’d better speak for 

"I’ll handle this, Mr. Cassidy,” Richter 
said. A brittle pride came into his eyes. 
"I’m also an able lawman.” He turned 
his attention to the three. "It’s not in my 
mind to mince words with any of you. 
Neither do I intend to take sides.” 

"Then what are you doing here,” Jim 
Kenyon asked. He had an unruly shock 
of hair that matched his temper. Moving 
around Rob, he stepped close to Richter’s 
stirrup. "Maybe you’d better stick to 
roustin’ drunks, Matshal. You’re stepping 
into something here that won’t rub off.” 

"I ought to lock you up,” Richter said. 

Cassidy, who observed this carefully, 
held his breath and waited for Jim Ken¬ 
yon’s answer. In a way, he knew what it 
would be, for when two men started to 
challenge each other, nothing could be 
settled. And this was a mistake on Rich¬ 
ter’s part; Cassidy had seen other lawmen 
make it. You can’t kick at the shins of a 
man’s pride and have him love you for it. 

"Why the hell don’t you just step off 
that horse and do it?” Jim suggested. 

Richter’s glance to Cassidy betrayed 
him; the marshal realized too late his mis¬ 
take, and he also knew that he would 
have to handle this by himself. 

"Very well,” Richter said stiffly. He 
dismounted and took off his hat, hanging 
it on the saddlehorn. 

Pointing to Rob and Barr, Richter said, 
"I’ll expect you two to stay out of this.” 

"We will,” Barr said. 


■■■aking off his gunbelt, Richter placed 
" it with his hat, then unbuttoned his 
sleeves to roll them. Jim Kenyon chose 
that time to hit him in the mouth. Arms 
flailing, Richter went back against his 
horse, and the animal would have bolted 
had not Cassidy already secured the reins. 
Mopping blood, Richter shook his head 
and moved clear of the horse. He met 
Jim Kenyon squarely, raking the young 
man across the eye with his fist, but Ken¬ 
yon had the edge and used it. 

Cassidy noticed that Jim was a wres¬ 
tler; he preferred it to fists. Richter un¬ 
expectedly flew over Jim’s hip and landed 
back-flat in the yard. Rob whooped and 
did a jig. Barr watched, bland-faced, as 
though the whole thing bored him. 

Richter made his feet, although his 
breath was a little pinched. Jim stepped in 

MAY, 1957 


and struck him under the heart, then 
grabbed him in back of the neck, whirled 
and threw him over his shoulder. 

The fight was over; Cassidy knew it 
and was smiling when Jim looked up. 
"You’ve been spending some time on the 
reservation, picking up wrestling tricks 
from the young bucks. I used to be pretty 
good at that myself.” 

"You wknt to step down and try it?” 
Jim invited. 

"No,” Cassidy said, "I’m a little old 
for those games now. Checkers is my 
pace, or solitaire if I want to set my own 
pace.” He glanced at Richter, now trying 
to get up. "Reminds me a little of Pete 
Kenyon. He got what he asked for too.” 


Uis glance touched the Kenyons. Barr 
looked at Rob, then shifted his feet. 
Jim thrust his hands deep in his pants 
pocket and scuffed dust with his boots. 
Finally he stepped toward Richter and 
offered a hand, but Richter snarled and 
pushed Jim Kenyon away. The brittle 
pride returned in the young man’s eyes 
and he wheeled and went into the house. 

Richter leaned against his horse, try¬ 
ing to still the dizziness robbing him of 
strength. Cassidy turned his head when 
he heard a buggy thumping along the 
road. He recognized Bess Avery before 
she wheeled in the yard. 

When Bess saw the marshall she gasped. 
Singling out Barr, she heaped the blame 
on him. "Shame on you! Haven’t you 
started enough trouble?” Before Barr Ken¬ 
yon could answer, Bess turned her fury 
on Quirt Cassidy. "What kind of a law¬ 
man were you to let this happen?” 

"Well, now, I-” 

"I don’t want to hear your excuses,” 
she snapped. Dismounting she tied the 
reins to an old flatiron, then flounced into 
the house. Her voice trailed behind. 
"Barr, I want to talk to you.” 

He looked briefly at Rob, who was 
turning to the barn and the peaceful work 
of saddle mending. To Cassidy he merely 
shrugged and followed Bess Avery. 

Richter was on his horse and as they 
turned, they could hear Bess’ scolding 
tones and Barr’s lame apology. 

"Better put your hat on,” Cassidy said. 
"The sun’s pretty hot.” 

Richter acted like he hadn’t heard, then 
he reached for his hat and slowly cas¬ 
caded off the horse, like a cloth slipping 
from the tilted edge of a table. Cassidy 
dismounted and knelt beside the marshal. 

"My back,” Richter said. "I—I must 
have pulled something.” 

"I’ll get the Kenyon boys,” Cassidy said 
and walked rapidly toward the house. He 
went in without knocking and Bess stop¬ 
ped in the middle of a sentence. Barr was 
at the table, looking a little ear-sore. He 
seemed relieved to see Quirt Cassidy. 

"That last fall must have hurt Richter’s 
back,” Cassidy said. "He fell off his 
horse.” 

"The poor man,” Bess said. "Barr, you 
bring him into the house this instant.’* 

He wanted to argue, but like most men, 
he preferred not to, which gave most 
wives the idea they had the upper hand. 

"I'll get Rob,” he said. 


MENPAST40 


Afflicted With Getting Up Nights, 
Pains in Back, Hips, Legs, 
Nervousness, Tiredness. 


_ ,__of the above symp¬ 

toms, the trouble may be due to Gland¬ 
ular Dysfunction. A constitutional Dis¬ 
ease for which it is futile for sufferers 
to try to treat themselves at home. 
Medicines that give temporary relief 
will not remove the cause of your 
trouble. 


To men of middle age or past this 
type of dysfunction qccurs frequently. 
It is accompanied by loss of physical 
vigor, graying of hair, forgetfulness and 
often increase in weight. Neglect of 
such dysfunction causes men to grow 
old before their time—premature senil¬ 
ity and possibly incurable conditions. 

Most men, if treatment is taken be¬ 
fore malignancy has developed, can be 
successfully NON-SURGICALLY treat¬ 
ed for Glandular Dysfunction. If the 
condition is aggravated by lack of 
treatment, surgery may be the only 
chance. 


NONSURS/CAL TREATMENTS 


The NON-SURGICAL treatments af¬ 
forded at the Excelsior Institute are the 
result of -20 years research by scientific 
Technologists and Competent Doctors. 


The War brought many new techniques 
and drugs. These added to the research 
already accomplishedhasproduced anew 
type of treatment that is proving of great 
benefit to man as he advances in years. 


_n of advancing years. Men from all 

walks of life and from over 3,000 cities 
and towns have been successfully treated. 
They found soothing and comforting re¬ 
lief and new health in life. 


EXAMINATION AT LOW COST 

On your arrival here, Our Doctors who 



I 

I ADDRESS- 
I 

J TOWN_ 

I 

{ STATE 


57 

















Cassidy went back to where Richter 
lay. A moment later Rob and Barr Ken¬ 
yon came up, carrying a kitchen door. 
They eased the marshal on it; he groaned 
mightily, then they carried him into the 
house. "Jim! Jim? Damn it, come when 
I call you!” Barr sent his shout through 
the house. 

When Jim Kenyon came down the short 
hall, Rob said, "You bunged up the mar¬ 
shal, Jim. Now you’re into it.” 

"Aw, hell,” Jim said, "a man ought to 
be tougher than that." ' 

"Well you go get Doc Ludlow out 
here," Barr said. 

"All right,” Jim said and stomped out 
of the house. A moment later he rode out. 

Barr had the marshal on the horsehair 
sofa. "You sufferin' much?" 

"My back," »Richter said. "Feels like 
it's busted for sure.” 

"Probably a wrench,” Rob said. 

"While you sit there and jabber,” Bess 
said, "the poor man could die.” She 
fussed over the marshal, fluffing a pillow 
to put under his head. 

Barr Kenyon got up and went into the 
living room to roll a smoke. Cassidy fol¬ 
lowed him, taking the makings Barr of¬ 
fered. The room was cool and crowded 
with heavy furniture. On the mantle sat 
a framed daguerreotype of a wild-eyed 
man in brush jacket and huge necker¬ 
chief. Cassidy picked it up and turned 
so that the light fell on it. "A good like¬ 
ness of your father,” he said. "I remem¬ 
ber the night it was taken.” 

"You do?” Barr Kenyon seemed in¬ 
tensely interested. 

"Yes," Cassidy said, smiling faintly. 
"Pete was in Dog Kelly’s place, having a 
few with the Rafter T outfit.” He shook 
his head. "Kelly ran a straight place, but 
three drinks of Dodge’s water-glass whis¬ 
key was enough to make any man hairy. 
Some of the boys got the idea they ought 
to get their picture taken. They did, but 
they nearly wrecked Shoemaker’s Photo¬ 
graphic Palace. I let your father sleep it 
off in the jail that night, and in the morn¬ 
ing I put that picture in his hand and sent 
him home. I figured that if a man could 
spend the night in jail just to have his 
picture taken, then he ought to have 
what he worked so hard to get.” 

"How do you remember all that?” Barr 
asked. 

"The remembering is easy,” Cassidy 
said softly. "Sometimes the forgetting is 
hard. That was a good night in Dodge. A 
lot of men got drunk and fought, but no 
one got killed.” He took a final pull on 
his cigarette, then cast it into the fire¬ 
place. "In a lot of ways your father was 
a fine man, Barr. A lot like Jim, in looks 
and temperament.” He looked steadily at 
Barr Kenyon, letting his glance penetrate. 
"Had he been more like you, I think he 
would have been alive today.” 


The young man whirled suddenly and 
■ stood facing the wall. In a moment he 
said, "All I remember of him is that he 
laughed a lot and loved all of us.” 

"Sure,” Cassidy said evenly. "Pete was 
like that. So’s Jim. After he’s gone, that’s 
what you’ll remember about him too. Tell 

58 


me something,' Barr, afe you going to 
hate the man who kills Jim?” 

Barr Kenyon spun around on his heel. 
"Kill him? What are you talking about? 
Hell, Jim’ll live to be a hundred.” 

"You really think so? He’s got a tem¬ 
per, Barr. And too much false pride. I 
said he was like Pete. He don’t know 
when to back down, and he don’t think 
that the rules ever apply to him.” 


F or a moment Barr Kenyon said noth¬ 
ing; he just stared at this slightly 
stooped old man with the mild blue eyes. 
"You know Jim better than I thought.” 

"Let's just say that I recognize the 
father coming out in one of his sons.” 
Cassidy sighed and wished, as he had 
wished a score of times before, that he 
could impart some of his accumulated 
knowledge to this man. How much dis¬ 
appointment the young could spare them¬ 
selves, if they could only take advice, 
was difficult to measure; life would surely 
be smoother. "Whose idea was it to 
crowd me the first night I came to town?” 
"Jim’s.” 

"Would you have tackled Richter to¬ 
day?” 

"No,” Barr said, quickly. "Jim let his 
pride get away from him.” 

"You wanted to get tough in the sa¬ 
loon last night,” Cassidy said. "Are you 
going to deny that you meant to set me 
up last night?” 

Barr Kenyon flushed and looked apolo¬ 
getic. "No, I won’t deny it. But Jim got 
me mad. A man’s liable to take it out 
on anybody when he gets mad.” He 
scrubbed a hand across the back of his 
neck. "You could have really licked me 
last night, Cassidy. I was so blamed mad 
at you I couldn’t see anything but red.” 

"When you go after a man,” Cassidy 
said, "go after him cold.” 

"Damn it, I know that,” Barr said, 
"but I can’t fight unless I get mad. Then 
I get licked and Richter throws me in 
jail.” 

Bess Avery came in then. "I put on 
some coffee,” she said. "Rob ought to 
be back with Doctor Ludlow in an hour.” 

"He still moaning about his back?” 
Barr asked. 

"Certainly. You hurt him, you big 
oaf!” 

"I didn’t! Jim did!” 

"You’re the oldest,” she said. "You 
ought to make him do what you say.” 

Barr Kenyon opened his mouth to speak, 
then slapped his thighs and shook out his 
tobacco again. Cassidy decided that the 
. young man was playing this smart; a 
man ought to keep his mouth shut around 
a pretty woman, opening it only to tell 
her how sweet she is. 

"I’ve got some chores that need do¬ 
ing,” Barr said and went out. A moment 
later the drop banged. 

"Why did you come out here?” Bess 
Avery asked. 

Cassidy sighed. "Because Marshal Rich¬ 
ter had to prove to me that a marshal in 
nineteen oh three’ is as good as they had 
in eighteen seventy-five.” 

"What?” She stared at him. "Why 
that’s ridiculous.” 


”1 wouldn’t care to classify it,” Cassidy 
said, “but it’s the truth. Richter wouldn’t 
agree. In fact he would deny it, but it’s 
a fact.” 

”1—1 don’t understand.” 

"Simple,” Cassidy explained. "Richter 
is a proud man. He's an untried man. I 
imagine there are times when he’s shav¬ 
ing and looks at himself in the mirror 
and asks, 'have I got courage?’ ” 

"Men are complex, aren’t they?” 

Quirt Cassidy laughed. "And women 
aren’t?” 

"Oh,” Bess said, "I suppose you know 
about women too.” 

"Well,” Cassidy said, "they were around 
when I was Barr’s age. And I noticed my 
share.” 

She sat down and folded her hands; 
this seemed to be a habit most women 
had, a demonstration of their patience, 
he supposed. And generally speaking, 
women needed all they had when dealing 

"Were there pretty girls in Dodge when 
you were—marshal?” 

"When I was young?” he nodded. "Yes, 
Dodge had its share of beauty.” The way 
he said it raised a question as to whether 
he was confining his thoughts to women. 
"There were some fast stepping fillies at 
Dora Hand’s place. The women across 
the deadline labeled them in big letters: 
all bad. Yet I’ve seen the time when the 
bad showed a lot of good, and the good 
ladies showed a lot of bad. The deadline 
is gone now, but the differences still 
remain.” 

"Did you have a girl?” Bess asked, 
"I’m not just being nosey. I really want' 
to know.” 

"Not in Dodge,” Cassidy said. "Before 
that, in Ellsworth. Her name was Eliza¬ 
beth and she had eyes the color of a clear 
pond right after a quick freeze. Some¬ 
times, when she would laugh. I’d think 
of a teal taking wing.” He turned and 
looked out the window at the vast ex¬ 
panse of land. "She was twenty when 
we were married, and she lived a year. 
Cholera took her and the baby at the 
same time.” 


The room was so silent that the clock’s 
" tick seemed to fill it. Finally Bess 
Avery said, "How you must have loved 
her to remember her so after all these 
years.” 

"Loved her?” Cassidy shook his head. 
"What a feeble word to express an emo¬ 
tion as big as the sky. We never talked 
of love, Elizabeth and I, but the feeling 
was there. I guess we looked at it as 
though it was a magic spell and we 
didn't want to spoil it.” He paused for a 
long moment. "She was the blood of my 
heart, that woman. The strength in my 
arms, and the will that kept me alive 
after shfe was gone.” 

”1—1 think the coffee’s done,” she said, 
rising. 

She started out of the room, then 
stopped. "Mr. Cassidy, when I spoke to 
you, it was Barr I was thinking of, and 
that was selfish of me.” He, started to 
speak, but she held up her hand. "Please 
let me finish. I don’t want anything to 

ADVENTURE 


happen to you, Mr. Cassidy. Believe me, 
I don’t.” 

Then she turned quickly and went down 
the hall, her heels tapping. Quirt Cassidy 
listened for a moment before turning 
back to the window. He looked at the 
land and the sun seemed brighter, and 
the warmth a little deeper. 

CHAPTER III 

DOCTOR Max Ludlow came out of 
the bedroom, his hunting case watch open 
in his hand. His expression was grave 
and Barr Kenyon stood up as though 
waiting for a judge’s verdict. 

"I’m afraid Marshal Richter has a 
sprained back,” Ludlow said. "I’ll send 
an ambulance out for him. See that he’s 
moved carefully.” 

"Yes, sir,” Barr Kenyon said, obviously 
relieved. 

Ludlow gathered his bag and hat, mov¬ 
ing toward the door. "I have to be going. 
I can give you a lift, Ewing.” 

"Thank you,” Cassidy said and stepped 
outside. He tied both Richter’s and the 
livery horse in back of Ludlow’s buggy, 
then got in. Barr Kenyon and Bess Avery 
came out to stand on the porch. 

"I’m sure sorry about this,” Barr said. 
”1 hope Richter ain’t lamed.” 

"He’ll be on his feet again in a month 
or so,” Ludlow said mildly. He lifted the 
reins as though to move out, then paused 
to add, "I would suggest that Jim stay 
around for a few days, in case there are 
any legal repercussions.” 

"Legal rep . . . ? What do you mean. 
Doc?” 

Ludlow’s shoulders rose and fell. 
"Richter is a law officer and he was as¬ 
saulted while performing his duty.” 

"Hell, don’t Richter have to make put 
a complaint first?” 

"Yes,” Ludlow said, "but who says he 
won’t?” He drove out then, the buggy 
wheels cutting twin plumes of dust. 

From the way Ludlow drove. Quirt. 
Cassidy surmised that he was angry. 
Finally Cassidy grinned and said, "Smoke 
a cigar. Max. It’ll do you good.” 

"Agh!” Ludlow said, then bit tfie end 
from pne of his Havanas. "That damned 
fool, Richter! What did he think he was 
doing anyway?” 

"Proving that he was a good man,” 
Cassidy said. 

"Trying to show off,” Ludlow said 
flatly. "Ewing, never a year passes but 
what I don’t set three or four broken 
arms for kids who were just showing off, 
climbing the apple tree or trying to walk 
a back fence.” He made a disgusted face. 
"And twenty years ago you used to carry 
men to my office so I could pick the bul¬ 
lets out, all put there because someone 
was showing off. Hell, don’t men ever 
outgrow it?” 

"Nope,” Cassidy said smiling. 

"Now we’re out a city marshal,” Lud¬ 
low said. 

"Do you really need one?” 

"Hhhmmmm!” Ludlow said. "Every 
town needs one. With Richter laid up, 
every young tough in Dodge will brew 
his own brand of hell to malfe someone 
miserable.” He shook his head violently. 
"No matter how peaceful a town seems 

MAY, 1957 


STAG 


the Iwrofe, nobody domed to pmwtl 

COMPLETE — UNABRIDGED — 
UNCENSORED EDITION 
MOST DARINGLY INTIMATE 
BOOK EVER PUBLISHED I 
OTHERS PRINT IMITATIONS ... 
WE DARE PRINT THE ORIGI- 




You've Heard About Her! You've Asked About Her! 

NOW YOU CAN SEE HER 

BETTY BROSMER 

IN HER MOST DARING 
AND REVEALING POSES 


The sensuous charms of this vibrant 
bombshell makes her the most 
sought after model in Hollywood. 
You'll thrill to these gorgeous 
unretouched, unusual poses or your 
money back! 

~ , LARGE GLOSSY 

_ _ PICTURES 

8 xlO’s 5x 7’s 4x 

and wallet size 
Only $ 1 »00 Postpaid 


DON’T DELAY...MAIL THIS COUPON TODAY! 


BETTY BROSMER SALES 

1124 No. La Brea, Dept.628 Hollywood 38, Calif. 

Please rush me your giant set of 200 new poses by 
mail. I enclose $1.00 in full payment. 

Nam e _ 



BETTY BROSMER SALES 
1124 No. la Brea, Dept.628 
Hollywood 38, Calif. 
















to be, Ewing, you got to have authority 
about because some people need constant 
reminding in order to stay in line.” 

When they reached Dodge, Cassidy 
went to the restaurant for his noon 
meal. He was finishing his second 
piece of apple flip when three men came 
in, saw him and approached his table. 
They were the new citizens of Dodge, 
wearing dark suits and soft shoes. 

The spokesman said, "Mr. Cassidy, may 
we sit down?” A wave of his hand was 
his invitation and in a moment the scrap¬ 
ing of chairs on the hardwood floor died 
out. The spokesman laid his soft hat on 
the table. He was a man in his early 
thirties, firm-faced, and well muscled. 
"Mr. Cassidy, I don’t suppose you’ll re¬ 
member me. I’m Page Randell.” 

Cassidy’s eyes pulled into wrinkled 
slits, then he smiled. "I think I do. I gave 
you a talking to once for throwing a rock 
through Dog Kelly’s front window.” 

Randell looked at the other and grinned. 
"You scared the hell out of me, Mr. Cas¬ 
sidy. I’d like you to meet Mr. Casten and 
Mr. Darlin.” 


They shook hands briefly. Cassidy said, 
■ "I knew your father well, Mr. Cas¬ 
ten.” His glance touched each of them. 
"What can I do for you gents?” 

"Ludlow spoke to us about Marshal 
Richter,” Page Randell said. "The town’s 
been quiet and Richter doesn’t have any 
deputies, so we thought, as the majority 
of the city council, that we ought to ap¬ 
point a temporary man in his place.” 

"We thought of you right away,” Cas¬ 
ten said. 

"Gentlemen, I’m retired,” Cassidy said. 

"We understand that,” Page Randell 
said, "but this is just a temporary thing.” 

Quirt Cassidy chuckled and" said, "Gen¬ 
tlemen, over twenty years ago another 
man said that to me when I was first 
sworn in as a United States Marshal.” 
He spread his hands. "Isn’t there someone 
else, a younger man?” 

"We’d like to have you,” Page Randell 
said. He smiled. "A lot'of the'old timers 
remember you, Mr. Cassidy, and the 
younger ones all know about you. We 
think you’d give the office prestige.” 

"Well, if you’re sure this is just temp¬ 
orary . . .” 

"It is, it is,” Page Randell said. "Judge 
Hooker has agreed to swear you in im¬ 
mediately if you agree.” 

The thought appealed to Quirt Cas¬ 
sidy; he did not try to deny it to him¬ 
self. He felt like an old firehorse asked 
to make one last dash and he was flat¬ 
tered. "All right," he said, rising. "I’ll 
accept.” 

Page Russell insisted on picking up the 
tab for the meal, and Quirt Cassidy prom¬ 
ised to be at Judge Hooker’s house in an 
hour. Leaving the restaurant, he walked 
along the back streets to Max Ludlow’s 

He went to his room then and opened 
his satchel. From the bottom he took his 
pistol, wrapped in a towel, and checked 
the mechanism. The holster and belt were 
useless; he could no longer draw with 
any speed. So he thrust the pistol into 

60 


his waistband and pulled his coat over 
it. The weight felt good and he paused 
before the mirror to check the knot in 
his tie before going out of the house. 

Tad was waiting at the corner and sided 
Cassidy as he walked toward Hooker’s 
house. "Gee, Mr. Cassidy, are you really 
going to be the jnarshal again, just like 
in the old days?” 

"For a time,” Cassidy admitted. 

"Golly,” Tad said, "I’ll bet you’ll be 
the marshal forever and ever. I told the 
kids you wasn’t scared of anything. Now 
you’ll show ’em, won’t you, Mr. Cassidy?” 

He stopped suddenly for the boy’s 
simple-intended remark struck home, and 
in a sentence encompassed the difficulties 
most men had with themselves. During 
the major run of Cassidy’s life' he had 
been showing others that he could, and 
would, carry out the law. No matter how 
many men he arrested, there would always 
be more that had to be shown that he 
meant what he said. 

And he wondered if he were guilty of 
this. Was that the reason he had accepted? 
He found no ready answer, yet the thought 
remained that perhaps he sought this 
chance to show another generation that 
what they had heard was true, that Quirt 
Cassidy was indeed a great law officer. 

"Is somethin’ the matter, Mr. Cassidy?” 
Tad asked this and reminded Cassidy that 
he was not alone. 

"No,” he said, putting his hand on the 
boy’s head. "No, everything’s all right. 
Tad.” He gave the boy a gentle shove. 
"You run along and play. I’ll tell you 
all about it at supper.” 

"Yes, sir.” He let out a ringing whoop 
and raced down the street. 

Judge Hooker met Cassidy at the door, 
his hand extended. "Good to see you 
again. Marshal,” Hooker said. 

"You’re looking fine, Elvis,” Cassidy 
said. "I was sure that you’d outgrow that 
office over the feed store.” 

Hooker laughed and led Cassidy into 
the parlor. Page Randell was there, as 
was Casten. Hooker offered Cassidy a 
drink, and when he declined, Hooker got 
down to business and swore him in. The 
brief words and passing moments once 
again vested Quirt Cassidy with author¬ 
ity; he took the badge and pinned it' on 
his shirt. 


R andell and Casten had to leave, and 
after the door closed. Hooker said, 
"What kind of a stunt was Richter try¬ 
ing to pull. Quirt?” 

"Pull?” Cassidy pretended innocence. 
”1 think Richter was within his rights.” 

"Quirt, there is no love lost between 
Richter and Barr Kenyon.” 

"Richter said that he had Barr in jail 
a couple of times, for fighting.” 

"Give you two guesses as to who Barr 
fought.” 

"Richter?” Cassidy seemed genuinely 
surprised. 

“Right. Quirt, did you ever see Barr’s 
girl, Bess Avery?” 

"Yes, at Ludlow’s and several times 
since.” He frowned. "What’s going on, 
Elvis?” 

"Richter’s been trying to make time 


there for a couple of years now. Bess is 
too kind to throw him out, but Barr knows 
what’s going on. I would say that Richter 
is trying to get Barr into trouble. He eggs 
the man on, if you know what I mean. 
On several past occasions when Barr 
appeared before me. I’ve tried to caution 
Richter, but he’s smart enough to play 
the game legally, making Barr out the 
villain.” 

"Do you want me to say that Richt,er 
was out of line?” 

"I already know that,” Hooker said. 
"Quirt, you’re the law now, but be care¬ 
ful. Richter is smart enough to involve 
you up to your ears.” 

"Thanks for the warning,'” Cassidy 
said, standing. 

He shook hands with Hooker and left, 
walking slowly toward Front Street. With¬ 
in an hour everyone in Dodge knew that 
Quirt Cassidy was again carrying the 
badge. A few of his old friends dropped 
in at the office to wish him well, and at 
four o’clock he stepped out and walked 
down the street. 


^Phe ambulance came down the street 
* and went to Ludlow’s house; a crowd 
formed along Front Street to watch it 
pass. A little after five, Barr Kenyon 
came into Dodge, dismounting in front 
of the marshal’s office. He saw Cassidy 
coming down the street and waited by 
the door. 

"Didn’t Jim come in with you?” Cas¬ 
sidy asked. 

"I tried to get him to come,” Barr 
Kenyon said, "but he’s too stubborn. He 
says that if anyone wants him, to come 
and get him. I can’t handle Jim anymore, 
Mr. Cassidy.” His glance touched the 
badge on Cassidy’s shirt. ”1 wouldn’t 
want to say what he’ll do when he hears 
about you taking Richter’s place.” 

"What are you going to do?” Cassidy 
asked. 

Barr Kenyon shrugged. "I’m going 
over to Bess Avery’s place and ask her 
to marry me. Then I’m going to pack my 
things and leave.” 

"To where?” 

'Missouri, I guess. Buy a farm some¬ 
place and settle down.” He sighed and 
bit his lip. I’m being pulled in deep. 
Marshal, and I don’t like it.” 

Cassidy studied Barr Kenyon. "When I 
came to town you were all set to tree me. 
This change of mind is sudden, isn’t it?” 

Barr Kenyon nodded. "Jim keeps say¬ 
ing that the Kenyons have to stick to¬ 
gether. I listened; hell, I couldn’t help 
myself because that was all he talked 
about when he heard you were coming 
back. The damn fool even went east to 
take the same stage with you, as though 
he didn’t want to take a chance on you 
changing your mind.” He spread his 
hands. "I’m the oldest. Marshal, and I 
guess I remember Pa the best, the way 
he really was. Well, Bess has been after 
me to get out, and danged if I don’t 
think she’s right. Jim’s got to make his 
own mistakes. I can’t help him.” 

"I want you to know that I never really 
believed Jim’s talk, that you didn’t give 
Pa every chance.” 


ADVENTURE 


"Thanks,” Cassidy said. When Barr 
Kenyon went out, a messenger arrived 
from Judge Hooker. Cassidy walked to 
the judge's house and found him in his 
study. 

"Ah,” Hooker said. "Sit down, Quirt. 
Sit down.” 

The judge fussed among a blizzard of 
papers, then shoved a legal document 
across the desk. "I signed that an hour 
ago, and I had no choice.” 

Quirt Cassidy read it, then tucked it in 
his coat pocket. "I sort of thought that 
Richter would swear out a warrant against 
Jim Kenyon.” 

"You don’t mind?” Hooker asked. 

Cassidy shrugged. "What good would 
it do?” 

"It beats me,” Hooker said, "why he 
did it. I mean, if there ever was a chance 
to get Jim at the point of a gun, this is 
it. And Jim would fight; he don’t have 
any better sense than his father had.” 
Hooker poured himself a drink. "Follow¬ 
ing that line of thought, Richter would 
make Barr mad enough to fight, and I’ve 
always believed that Richter has been 
trying to work Barr up to a shooting.” 
He held up his hand when Cassidy started 
to speak. "So help me, I believe that. 
Quirt.” 

"I’ll serve this in the morning,” Cas¬ 
sidy said, rising. "Good-night, Judge.” 

"Yes,” Hooker said. "And good-luck.” 

Cassidy started back toward the center 
of town, then changed his mind and took 
a long cross street to Richter’s house. 
Ludlow’s buggy was tied to the hitching 
post and Cassidy went up the walk. The 
housekeeper let him in and he saw Lud¬ 
low through the open bedroom door. 


The doctor seemed surprised to see Cas- 
* sidy, but Richter acted as though he 
had been expecting him. 

"How’s the back?” Cassidy asked. 

"It’ll get better,” Richter said. He 
looked at Ludlow and plainly wished 
him out of the room, yet Ludlow pre¬ 
sented a bland stubbornness and continued 
to write out his prescription. 

"I just came from Judge Hooker’s 
house,” Cassidy said. "Jle gave me a war- 


"Then serve it,” Richter said. His glance 
touched the badge and a smile built slow¬ 
ly. "That’s what you’re getting paid for.” 

"I suppose it is,” Cassidy said and 
pulled a chair around. "You’re not a very 
dense man, Mr. Richter; I’m surprised 
that more people haven’t seen through 
you before this.” 

"What’s that supposed to mean?” Rich¬ 
ter said. He looked at Ludlow. "If you’re 
through, get out.” 

"This sounds interesting,” Ludlow said 
and leaned against - the wall. 

"The only reason you went out there 
to the Ken—" ” r. 
to prove t 


and that i 
back. Not 

your plac 

you couldn’t prove you 
me, then you’d prove that I 

MAY, 1957 


the odds were good t 


than your 
that the 
:o take 
that if 


MEAT CUTTING Offers YOU 

SUCCESS And SECURITY 

In Hie Best Established Business In lie World • PEOPLE MOST EAT! 


TRAIN QUICKLY in 8 »hort week, for a bright 

ITABLE MARKET OF YOUR OWN! 



TtSST , - 



better than you. Or at 1, 
hole in my reputation.” ( 
the warrant and tapped it against his leg. 
"Do you think Jim will put up a fight, 
Richter?” 

"You're damned right he will,” Richter 
said. "Just like his old man did.” 

"Well, that puts the last dab of paint 
on the picture,” Cassidy said. "All you 
have to do now is wait, Mr. Richter.” 

"I’ll do that well enough,” Richter said. 
Cassidy got up and stepped to the door. 
Then Richter said, "You’re just a tired 
old man, Cassidy, blood-sucking sympathy 
from a long time ago. Hell, when those 
stories are told over and over again, they 
get stretched out of shape. And the people 
in Dodge are going to find out that you’re 
just an old windbag capitalizing on talk.” 

"Why goddamn you . . .” the doctor 

bC "Let it go,” Cassidy said. He went out 


rluttered by si 
windmills. The Kenyon place se 
serted when Cassidy rode into 
He did not dismount and then 
yon stepped out to the shady 

"That’s far enough,” Jim sai 
guess why you’re here.” He won 
the bottom of the holster secur 
thigh with a piece of rawhide. 

"I wouldn't want you to gu< 
sidy said. "So to remove all doul 
you that Richter’s sworn out % 
for your arrest.” 

"So?” 

"So I’ll have to make that art 
sidy said evenly. 

"Then make it,” Jim invited, 
for you to draw.” 

Cassidy laughed and watched 


"Forgf 
understand 
"I don’t 


ight to give him S( 
>et it,” Cassidy sai 


something . . 
lid. "Don’t y 
all, Max?” 
;tand his kirn 


. don’t,” Cassidy said, "but 
its Deen my observation that those are 
the ones a man has to understand best, 
the ones he don’t like.” 

Ludlow sought comfort in a cigar. As 
they walked toward his buggy, he said, 
"I suppose you’ll serve the warrant.” 

"Most certainly,” Cassidy said. 

"Well, I sure won’t tell you your busi¬ 
ness," Ludlow said. "Can I drive you to 
the house?” 

"That’ll be fine. Max.” 


H e spent the night in the spare r 
and in the morning, he had an c 
breakfast. Then he sent word to 
stable to have a horse saddled. 

The stableman had picked out a 
gelding; Cassidy mounted and swung 


ss,” Cas- 
t, I’ll tell 


r father. 
y twenty- 
e you so 


of here,” 

t I’ll tell 
“ a shoot 


Can’t you come in like a man, p 
five dollars and forget it? Or ; 
mixed up that you have to 1 
straighten yourself out?” 

"You either draw or tuck 
between your legs and get out 
Jim Kenyon said. 

"I’ll go,” Cassidy said, "bi 
you why first. I wouldn’t ha\ 
out with you here.” He smiled 
like witnesses when I down a r 
people something to talk about 
Now if you’ve got the guts, 
into Dodge this afternoon ’anc 
you where the town can see it.’ 

"Don’t think I won’t,” Jit 


Cassidy turned his horse and rode out, 
not looking back. 

The town openly showed their disap¬ 
pointment when Quirt Cassidjl returned 
alone. There was talk, but none to Cas¬ 
sidy. Everyone was adding two and two 
and coming up with the answer that the 
great Quirt Cassidy had backed down. 

This was an expected reaction, but 


61 












STRIKES 

AND 

SPARES 

b y 

Gene Longtine 


Thousands of people in the city 
of Baltimore have been breaking 
the law for years. An old ordinance 
outlawing bowling has never been 
removed from the books. 

• 

A bowling marathon conducted 
in a Honolulu bowling center start¬ 
ed at noon on September 2, 1949, 
and ended at one a.m. on September 
4th, when Eddie Williams rolled 
the last ball. His performance was: 
175 games rolled in thirty-seven 
hours, with an average score of 
177.4 per game. He walked ap¬ 
proximately twenty-three miles and 



lifted more than twenty-two tons of 
ball. He rolled the ball 3,000 times 
for a total distance of eighty-three 
miles, knocked down approximately 
forty-nine tons of pins, with a total 
pin-fall of 31,047. He rolled a high 
game of 255 and bowled thirty 
games with a score of 200 or more. 


Probably the greatest three-game 
series score for an individual was 
recorded on October 25, 1939 by 
Albert R. Brandt at Lockport, New 
York. He rolled 297, 300, 289-for 
a total of 886 for the three games. 


when Tad came in at noon, his eyes red 
from crying, Cassidy wished that he had 
taken his chances with Jim Kenyon. 

"You’ve been fighting?” Cassidy asked, 
looking at Tad’s dusty clothes. 

"Billy Haskell said you was a coward,” 
Tad said, his lips twitching. 

"Do you believe that?” 

"Everyone knows you didn’t arrest Jim 
Kenyon," Tad said. "How come you didn’t 
arrest him?” 

The door opened and Max Ludlow 
came in. "So there you are. Get for home. 
Your mother’s worried about you.” He 
closed the door when the boy left, then 
perched on the corner of Cassidy’s desk. 
"I won’t ask you what happened out 
there, Ewing. It’s none of my business. 
But damn it, the talk’s going around now 
that . . 

"Let them talk,” Cassidy said. "Max, I 
have to make this arrest in town.” 

"A shoot out?” 

"He doesn’t want it any other way,” 
Cassidy said. He held his hands before 
him and studied their gnarled lines. 
"Think there’s any speed left in these. 
Max?” 

"Good God, man . . .” 

“Just one more time, that’s all I ask 
of them,” Cassidy said. He looked at Doc¬ 
tor Ludlow. "Don’t look so stricken. I 
have to meet him, not you.” 

”1 won’t stand for this!” 

"The devil you won’t,” Cassidy said. 
"Max, if one man lifts one finger to help 
me, Richter will have been right. Do you 
want him to be right?” 


"No, no,” Ludlow said, turning away. 
"But I don’t want you dead either, and 
if you face Jim Kenyon, you will be. He’s 
damned fast. I’ve seen him practice.” 

"The cards are down, Max, and the 
bets have been made.” 

"Sure, sure,” Ludlow said, going to the 
door. "I wish to God you’d never come 
back to Dodge, Ewing.” 

He went out then, closing the door. 
Cassidy sat at his desk, his eyes veiled 
and his face inscrutable. When a decent 
hour had passed, he carefully checked the 
loads in his long-barreled Remington, then 
pulled his coat over the weapon and 
stepped to the boardwalk. 

There were not many people on the 
streets of Dodge and for a moment time 
returned, making the town like it had 
been in the old days. He supposed there 
were no more than two dozen men in 
town who had ever witnessed a gun 
fight, yet this new generation knew what 
to do. Instinct, he supposed. All the busi¬ 
ness houses were open and people stayed 
inside where they could see, yet avoid 
ill-directed bullets. 

From a gap between two buildings, 
Cassidy heard a choked sob and turned 
to find Tad Ludlow crouched, there. ”1 
thought your father sent you home,” he 
said. 

"I got to stay,” Tad said. "Please, I 
just got to.” 

Cassidy nodded once, then turned his 
attention again to the street. He wondered 
how Jim Kenyon would play this, and 
decided that it would be bold. 


For nearly an hour Quirt Cassidy 
waited, and the town waited with him. 
Then at the end of the street he saw Jim 
Kenyon riding in at a walk. A half a 
block down, Kenyon dismounted and care¬ 
fully tied his horse. 

Quirt Cassidy stepped out into the 
street, but was careful to remain in the 
shade of the overhang. Seventy yards 
separated the two men and Jim Kenyon 
began to walk. He wore no coat and his 
right shirt sleeve was rolled to the elbow 
so it would not catch on his gun while he 
drew. 

When the gap closed to sixty yards, 
Cassidy said, "That’s far enough, Jim. I 
have a warrant for your arrest on the 
charge of assault and .resisting arrest. 
Will you lay down your arms and submit 
to proper authority?” 

"You know the answer to that,” Jim 
Kenyon said and took another step. 

"You leave me no choice,” Quirt Cas¬ 
sidy said. He reached into his pocket and 
brought out his glasses, carefully adjust¬ 
ing them to the bridge of his nose. He 
fussed with the fit around his ears and 
Jim Kenyon closed the distance to fifty 
yards. 

Then quite calmly Quirt Cassidy drew 
his long-barreled Remington and cocked 
it. Jim Kenyon cursed for the distance 
was yet too great, but he dared not stand 
still now that the battle opened. His draw 
was long-practiced magic and he fired his 
first shot before Quirt Cassidy even 
brought his gun level. 

The bullet sprayed dust as Cassidy 
turned sideways and crossed his arms. 
Leaning the barrel on his left forearm, he 
squinted carefully. Jim Kenyon rolled 
another shot, this time hitting the side¬ 
walk to whine away into the distance. 
Almost in panic he started to run toward 
Cassidy, anything to bring him in where 
his aim was more certain. 

Then the slowly tightening finger 
touched off Cassidy’s gun and Jim Kenyon 
spun around, his gun flying from his 
fingers. He fell to one knee, clutching his 
upper arm. 

ssidy put his gun away and walked 
toward Kenyon. Tad was at his heels 
and when Cassidy pressed through the 
crowd. Tad clutched his coat so as not to 
lose him. A respectful lane opened up 
and Cassidy looked down at Jim Kenyon. 

"Is it bad?” Cassidy asked. 

”1 don’t guess you broke it,” Jim Ken¬ 
yon said. "God damn old fox, you didn’t 
let me get close! I’d have beat you, damn- 
nit! I’d have beat you!” Then his head 
tipped forward and the fight and anger 
drained away, leaving him like a clean 
sore ready for the patient time necessary 
to heal it. 

"Someone get him over to the doctor’s 
place,” Cassidy said and moved to the 
sidewalk. He saw the two Kenyon boys 
there, and Bess Avery. 

Barr Kenyon said, "That was no lucky 
shot, Cassidy. You could have put that 
bullet right between his eyes and no one 
would have blamed you.” 

"I’d have blamed myself,” Cassidy said 
and went on to his office. 


62 


ADVENTURE 





He sat down at the desk and only then 
became aware of Tad Ludlow standing 
in the door, his eyes round and shining. 
"Come in, son,” Cassidy said. Tad tim¬ 
idly took a chair for who is not nervous 
in the presence of their king? "Today you 
saw your first gun fight, didn't you?” 

"Yes, sir.” 

"Did you like it, Tad?” 

"No—no, sir. I was scared. But you 
weren’t scared, were you, Mr. Cassidy? 
You just stood there and let him shoot 
and you weren't scared at all.” 

Cassidy smiled and massaged the back 
of his neck. "Tad, the only reason I'm 
sitting down is because I can’t trust my 
legs to stand on. Son, listen to me, and 
remember what I have to say. All men 
are scared, and they do their most foolish 
acts when they’re scared.” 

"I didn't know that,” Tad said. 

"It’s true,” Cassidy said and took off 
his glasses. 'He folded them gently so as 
not to spring the frames; the case closed 
with a loud snap. "Tad, some day you’re 
going to be an-old man, and I want you 
to remember what you saw today. And 
when you remember it, think back and 
understand that being old is pretty nice, 
once you get used to it." He smiled. "The 
night I showed you my hands, I guess I 
was feeling pretty sorry for myself be¬ 


cause I was old. I want you to forget I 
said that. Today, it was knowledge that 
stood by me, not youth. A knowledge 
only an old man can have. Maybe I’m 
not fast anymore, but all the practice I’ve 
had with a sixgun has made me pretty 
accurate.” He got up and put his arm 
around the boy’s shoulder, and the look 
Tad Ludlow gave him was worth walking 
across an acre of burning prairie for. 

"Won’t Jim Kenyon try to shoot you 
now?” Tad asked. 

"Nope,” Cassidy said. "He’ll think 
about it and let it go. You see. Tad, I 
gave him a fair chance: He’ll remember 
that.” Cassidy opened the door and urged 
the boy outside. "Getting close to supper 
time, isn’t it? I wonder if your mother’s 
going to have chicken-pie? She was mak¬ 
ing a tasty looking crust the last time I 
saw her.” 

Cassidy walked along. Tad hopskipping 
a pace behind. The streets of Dodge were 
again populated. People smiled and spoke 
and Quirt Cassidy politely tipped his hat. 

Before he turned off to Doctor Lud¬ 
low’s house, Cassidy paused for one more 
look at the street. Funny that he had 
thought the town had changed, lost its 
old warmth. He felt it now, strong and 
sure, and this whetted his appetite for 
chicken pie. ■ ■ 


I WATCHED HIM DIE! continued from page m 


Singapore, the hot, lush, British-owned 
port in Southeast Asia, was being rocked 
by riots of rising violence. Communist 
stooges, creeping from caves and slums, 
were working up a hideous mob of fan¬ 
atics, gangsters and secret society thugs 
to a murderous pitch. 

Symonds, the lanky, six-foot-tall, 
twenty-nine-year-old Southeast Asia chief 
for United Press, the American news 
agency, was a conscientious reporter. He 
picked up the phone to ask the Singapore 
police what they knew about the crash¬ 
ing, echoing blast which had just rolled 
over the jittery city. 

But obviously he was calling the wrong 
number. "What in bloody hell are you 
talking about?” the police official at the 
other end of the wire b'arked. "We don’t 
know of any blast. If you need headlines 
• for your papers, go chase them else¬ 
where.” 

Gene shrugged off the snub. Like most 
foreign newsmen he had more or less 
given up hope of getting the time of day 
out of Singapore’s finest. But it was part 
of his job to get the news regardless of 
the difficulties. 

He poked his head through the door of 
his local office manager. Wee Kim Wee, a 
crack Chinese newsman. 

"I’m going out,” Gene said. "Got to 
find out what’s going on.” 

"Be careful!” Wee warned. 

But Gene was already gone. He took 
the elevator down. Outside, broad, tree- 
lined Robinson Road baked in the blast¬ 
furnace heat of the late afternoon sun. 
Gene quickly looked up and down the 
street. The rare pedestrians were hurry¬ 
ing as though they were anxious to get 
under cover. The usual torrent of traffic 


was down to a trickle. Gene stopped one 
of the few cabs. He told the driver: 

"Alexandra Road—or as close as you 
can get.” 

Alexandra Road was the focal point of 
the violence, taking in an area four miles 
square, since noon sealed off by police 
armed with high-pressure firehoses. In¬ 
side, a crazed mob, 2,000 strong, was 
looting, burning and killing at will. 

"I’m not going to Alexandra Road,” 
the cab driver said. "I want to live, tuan." 

While scouting for another cab, Gene 
spotted Edward Hunter, a London news¬ 
man, coming toward him. 

"You’re the man I want to talk to,” 
Gene hailed him. "This blast a few min¬ 
utes ago, y’know what it, was?” 

Hunter took the pipe out of his mouth. 
"No jjlast. Lightning. It struck some oil 
drums down at the docks.” 

"Are you kidding? There isn’t a cloud 
in the sky.” 

"That’s Singapore for you,” Hunter 
said. "The sky here is always full of 
surprises.” 

And that, as Gene Symonds knew, 
covered more than the weather. The city, 
along with the Malayan hinterland just 
across the Strait, was in the path of ex¬ 
plosive communist violence. 

"They started more fyes,” Gene said 
looking at the black mushroom clouds of 
smoke billowing in the brassy sky. "These 
maniacs will burn the whole place down 
unless they’re stopped.” 

"Don’t worry yourself so much,” Hun¬ 
ter said. "What you need is a drink.” 

"No, thanks. I’ve got work to do.” The 
gangling American hurried off. 

From the nearby Savor Hotel he called 
Wee Kin Wee to find out if any of the 


lasting Mutual Satisfaction 
For All Couples 
With These Brand New 



GIANT SIZE BOOK 


Packed with 


HUNDREDS of PICTURES 

Many In Life-Like Color 



MAY, 1957 


63 














Chinese legmen had ’phoned in some hot 
item. 

The news from Alexandra Road he 
learned was alarming. More and more 
rioters kept arriving by truck. Armed with 
bricks, rocks, bicycle chains nailed to 
bamboo rods and blazing kerosene torches, 
they had assaulted the police roadblocks 
from the outside. Smashing three of them, 
they had joined forces with the jumping, 
seething mob inside the bottled-up square. 
As Singapore’s big businessmen, who are 
busily trading with the Chinese Reds, are 
loathe to offend their own commies, police 
had strict orders not to get tough. 

"Call our legmen back,” Gene in¬ 
structed Wee. ”1 don’t want anyone to 
get hurt.” 

"Okay,” Wee said. "Wait a moment- 
cable from New York just arrived. They 
want you to do a background story on 
the riots and the situation in Malaya.” 

^ymonds didn’t have to fumble for 
^ notes to do the piece; for over a year 
lie had been living the information. 

The current trouble in Singapore had 
started as it might have in Gene’s own 
hometown, Dayton, Ohio. Twelve days 
back, a bus company had fired its union 
employees and hired non-union labor. The 
fat was in the fire. Union men, strongly 
supported by the general public, picketed 
and protested. Before the week was up 
commie shock troops were running the 
show. They had at their disposal Singa¬ 
pore’s notorious underworld gangs and 
the students, nearly all fanatical Reds. 
Moscow had long been out to put the 
torch of revolution to this Western 
stronghold and here was a readymade 
opportunity. 

To topple the British Crown Colony 
would be well worth the trouble. An 
island city like Manhattan, this one-time 
lair of tigers and pirates dominates the 
cross-roads of two oceans. One of the 
world’s busiest ports, it sits astride the 
sea lanes linking Suez with the Philip¬ 
pines and San Francisco; it cpntrols and 
protects the vast rubber plantations of 
Malaya. 

But for all of Singapore’s importance. 
Western man. Gene thought, hadn’t done 
right by it. The gleaming, air-conditioned 
luxury structures rise up from a sea of 
oriental slums whose squalor has to be 
seen to be believed. A handful of stuck- 
up colonial administrators who haven’t 
learned much since 1776 when they lost 
other valuable colonies, lord it contempt¬ 
uously over people who were there long 
before them. 

"They need little,” one monocled official 
at the Governor’s Mansion had loftily 
assured Symonds. "A handful of rice a 
day, that’s all.” 

"That’s what makes a Red out here— 
a handful of rice a day,” Gene had come 
back. 

Singapore is one of the ripe plums the 
Reds have their eyes oh. The other is the 
British protectorate Malaya, connected 
with Singapore by a causeway flung 
across the narrow Strait of Johore. Malaya 
is the fabled country of steaming jungles, 
elephant herds and a ferocious breed of 


tigers. The jungles, incidentally, keep 
half the world’s cars running on air- 
cushioned wheels; Malaya is the world’s 
largest single source of natural rubber. 

But ever since 1948 the Malayan plum 
has been getting quite a pounding. A 
tattered, tough band of communists— 
never more than 4,000—range up and 
down the country which is about the size 
of New York State. They wreck, burn, 
kill, hoping chaos will soon give them 
control. Opposing them are 150,000 Brit¬ 
ish troops on war footing, fighting with 
everything from ghurka knives to air¬ 
borne napalm bombs, to the tune of 
$250,000,000 a year—and never make a 
dent in the Red strength. 

Swift, elusive, the jungle guerillas are 
everywhere and nowhere. Surprise and 
terror are their weapons. Never striking 
twice in the same place, they derail trains, 
ambush cars, gut villages, destroy rubber 
plantations, shoot planters and threaten 
loyal natives. When the dirty work is 
done they fade back into the virgin jungle 
to get ready for the next bout. 

The famed railroad running through 
Malaya didn’t escape the guerillas’ 
treacherous fury. Trains jumped surrep¬ 
titiously loosened rails, careened into 
abysses where steel bridges had been, hit 
dynamite charges and blew up. 

Gene Symonds had seen for himself 
this weird jungle war waged by the 
planters and the military. 

In Malaya’s bustling capital, Kuala 
Lumpur, an hour’s plane hop from Singa¬ 
pore, he got to know O. Maynard Moore, 
a tall blond Britisher, who ran several 
large rubber plantations. 

"Read this,” Moore said, pushing a 
letter at Symonds. "I got it this morning 
from one of my managers up-country.” 

The letter blew a blue note: "It is my 
sad duty to inform you that last night 
Assistant Manager George W. Appleby, 
one of our best men, was murdered by 
communist guerillas . . .” In addition, the 
terrorists had slashed several hundred 
rubber trees and burned a building. 

“I have to drive up there,” Moore told 
Symonds. "Want to join me?” 

An hour later they started out, travel¬ 
ing in an American car that had been 
' dipped in steel. It was armor^plated all 
around, with slits for windows. 'As soon 
as they cleared the outskirts of the city, 
Moore quietly put his "jungle comforter,” 
a gleaming .45 automatic on the seat 
next to him and lowered the armored 
visors. 

"Those terrorists may be waiting for us 
around any bend,” Moore said grimly. 
"Every day they shoot up one or two 
cars along here.” 


Twenty minutes later they ran into 
" what looked like another highway 
incident. An empty car stood by the side 
of the road and next to it sprawled the 
body of a man. He was dressed in a 
white shirt, shorts and straw hat, the 
British planter’s usual getup. Moore 
slowed, 'tensely peering ahead through 
the visor slit. The man on the road stirred 
slightly. Moore pulled up alongside him. 

"The man needs help,” Symonds said. 


"We’ll see. Open the door. A couple of 
inches, no more. Be ready to slam it shut 
at the first sign of trouble.” 

Mystified, Symonds opened the door a 
crack. Moore picked up his .45 and fired. 
The bullet zinged into the dirt an inch or 
two from the sprawling man’s head. The 
effect was startling. Uttering an animal 
yell, the man jumped up and dived into 
the jungle. 

"Chinese,” Moore said. "A decoy. I 
was afraid of that.” 


ne had shut the door in the nick of 
time. Bullets started peppering the 
car’s steel shell. Just as Moore was shift¬ 
ing into gear a native jumped on the 
hood blocking the visor with palm leaves. 

Taking advantage of Moore’s momen¬ 
tary helplessness, other guerillas swarmed 
over the car. A desperate gamble offered 
the only chance of survial. Without seeing 
the road, Moore raced the car forward, 
jerked to a stop,’ raced backward, then 
forward again, always braking suddenly 
till the last guerilla was shaken off. And 
after that the Britisher just kept going like 
hell, ziggagging all over the road to dodge 
bullets aimed at the vulnerable tires. Then 
after a couple of twists in the road the 
shooting faded away. 

"I’m a bloody fool,” Moore cursed 
himself, wiping the sweat off his face. 
"This is getting to be a hoary trick—the 
murdered planter. Trouble is, some of 
them do get murdered.” 

Except for the sight of an overturned, 
still smoldering car with no murdered 
planter in view, the rest of the 150-mile 
trip was uneventful. Every so often Sy¬ 
monds noticed strange settlements sur¬ 
rounded by barbed wire, searchlights and 
watchtowers. 

"Prison camps?” he asked. 

"These are the new villages we built,” 
Moore explained, not without pride. The 
idea was, lock up the entire population of 
an area and they can’t join the guerillas. 
In the morning the men are taken by 
trucks to work on plantations and are 
brought back to be shut in again in the 
evening. 

When Symonds and his host reached 
• their destination—a vast rubber estate with 
a rambling mansion—the sudden tropical 
night had dropped like a black -curtain. 
Searchlights in the watchtowers picked up 
Moore’s car and escorted it to the tall 
iron gate where two special policemen 
presented arms. A colt-size Great Dane, 
followed by his master, Fred M. Lark, the 
plantation manager, came from the build¬ 
ing to greet the arrivals. 

"I was worried about you,” Lark, a 
ruddy-faced, stocky Englishman, cried. 
"The bandits are giving us so much trouble 
these days.” 

After dinner Symonds and Lark sat up 
talking about what it’s like living in this 
hostile wilderness. 

"It’s bloody hell," Lark sounded off. 
Can’t make a step without an armed es¬ 
cort. Can’t remain in one spot more than 
fifteen minutes or do the same thing at 
the same time two days in a row without 
risking an ambush. 

"The worst part of this life,” the man- 


64 


ADVENTURE 


ager went on, "is that you never know 
who to trust. I had a servant for eight 
years. I would have bet my right arm 
that he was a hundred per cent loyal. Yet, 
he turned out to be a commie. One day 
he lured me into an ambush that damn 
near cost me my life. What I can't un¬ 
derstand is that these primitive natives 
turn to politics. Before this uproar started 
seven years ago they never dared to ask 
for more than a couple of yards of mos¬ 
quito netting and a handful of rice a day.” 

Symonds quoted himself. "It’s the hand¬ 
ful of rice that makes Reds.” But this point 
of view displeased the planter. 

"You Americans are nuts—always want¬ 
ing to help the wrong people. Why don’t 
you help us?” 

Speaking of help. Gene had a little 
story for the angrily spluttering man. He 
said he had been a frontline correspond¬ 
ent in Korea where United States troops 
carried most of the hideous burden of 
stopping the Red tide. 

"You planters ought to be given credit 
for one thing though,” Gene went on. 
"You supplied us with rubber we needed 
badly. Only you jacked up the price over¬ 
night from nineteen cents a pound to 
eighty-eight cents. That cooked your goose. 
We took our wartime synthetic rubber 
plants out of mothballs and have been 
making our own ever since.” 9 

Lark gulped his drink and decided it 
was time to hit the sack. 

Next morning he was his cheery old 
self again. He took Symonds to see his 
rubber trees. Some were up to seventy-five 
feet high. Stahding among them you could 
hear the latex drip into tin cups—a forest 
of leaky faucets. 

Lark beamed with pride, but Gene Sy¬ 
monds couldn’t share his host’s enthusi¬ 
asm. Having been around Southeast Asia 
he knew rubber trees. Like all over Ma¬ 
laya, these were the unimproved kind, 
straight from the jungle. 

"How much rubber do your trees 
yield?” he asked. 

"Four hundred pounds a year per acre,” 
Lark said. "But we’re planting some next 
year that'll give twice as much." 

"You’ve got a problem on your hands,” 
Symonds replied. "A few months ago I 
visited the American Goodyear plantation 
on the island of Sumatra. Their bud- 
grafted trees yield three thousand nine 
hundred pounds a year. You just can’t 
compete with that.” 


^)oor Lark blew a gasket. "You Ameri- 
_ cans are troublemakers. Never satis¬ 
fied with what you’ve got. Always want¬ 
ing more and more. You’re responsible 
for all the discontent in the world to¬ 
day.” 

And now that he was charging like an 
angry rhino, he’ really let Gene have it. 
"Last year two American tractor salesmen 
came through here. They wanted to sell 
me tractors for jungle clearing. Tractors, 
mind you! Who in hell ever heard of 
using tractors with all the cheap labor 
around. I told those Yanks where they 
could go.” 

"In Sumatra they use tractors,” Sy¬ 
monds said gently. "The advantage being 

MAY, 1957 




HERE S your kind OF FILM CLUB! Choose 
from America’s largest library of “films with 
a difference”- shot not for mail order but to 
the repeat-trade” needs of. arcade owners! 
You select the models i ■ ■ • ■' < 

and type films you want 1 
-or have movies shot to * 
order for little ipore than 
“stock”film. Choose from 100’s 
of lovely, bountifully-endowed 
models...name the “plot.” Your '} 
name appears in title and you ' 
figure in a hilarious surprise 
sequence! As Hollywood’s larg¬ 
est adult film producers we of¬ 
fer you a wider selection of 
better films at lower cost. Try 
us - you’ll never again be con¬ 
tent with other offerings! 

8mm VIEWER at COST! 

i members (reg. 4.95) I 
my every month! 

(No “Gimmicks”)' 


• Only $2.95 to 

• No obligation to 
‘TT^bersbi 


□ Rush Free PFC Brochur 

□ I enclose 25 if. Also s 

□ 8mm. □ 16mm. 

□ I enclose $1. 

Send 8mm. reel ppd. 
Satisfaction guaranteed 


Oo not send coupon unless 21 



the work is done fast and you don’t need 
two policemen to protect every planter 
and an army to protect the policemen.” 

A few weeks after this stormy visit. 
Gene saw for himself what that famed 
British jungle army tfas up against. With 
a party of newsmen—a Frenchman, a Ca¬ 
nadian and an Australian—accompanied 
by two British constables, he set out for 
Rengam, 150 miles from Singapore, a 
1,500 square-mile area of bandit-infested 
jungle, hills and swamps. 

The newsmen’s destination was a dam 
which British troops were said to have 
secured the day before—a highly exagger¬ 
ated claim, it turned out. Leaving the ar¬ 
mored car the group had come in, the 
constables led the newsmen down a nar¬ 
row path toward the river. Sunshine 
glinted off the dam’s bright-red gates and 
the water foaming down the spillway. 

While Symonds was snapping pictures 
the Canadian newsman started crossing 
the dam. Suddenly the rattle of a machine 
gun shattered the stillness. Bullets whizzed 
all around, striking the dirt and ricochet¬ 
ing from the dam’s steel beams. It was a 
Red ambush all right. 

"We ran back and took cover behind 
a shack and a pile of timber,” Symonds 


was to report later. "The bullets kept 
ripping through the thin walls and sending 
pieces of wood flying.” 

There was only one way out—back over 
the narrow path they had come. Only the 
first seventy-five yards of it were now in 
the line of fire. To try to make a break 
for it looked like a good way to commit 
suicide. 

After a while the Reds stopped firing 
except for an occasional shot. V^hat kept 
them from swooping down on the trapped 
party? Maybe they were afraid of getting 
trapped themselves, suspecting enemy re¬ 
inforcements were just around the bend. 

Gene Symonds kept nervously jabbing 
at a piece of timber with a ballpoint pen 
which would never write again. "We’ve 
got to get out of here,” he said. "Run like 
hell. One at a time, at irregular intervals. 
That may catch them off guard and give 
us enough of an advantage to make it.” 

"Sure, let’s try,” one of the constables 
said, grinning, but he felt like the rest of 
them, pretty sick. 

The Aussie newsman insisted on try¬ 
ing his luck first. Bullets sang after him. 
But thanks to the split-second time lag 
his dash caught the Red gunners by sur¬ 
prise and he got across safely. 


65 















One of the constables was next. The 
poor devil stumbled over a rock and fell 
flat on his face. The Red machine-gunners 
made a sieve out of him. 

The Canadian went third. This was one 
of his lucky days. 

Ten minutes later Symonds heard the 
silent summons in the back of his mind. 
Crouching down he turned to the other 
men. "This is the hardest thing I ever 
did in my life," he said and was off, run¬ 
ning like a ferret. 

"One moment my brain was lucid,” 
he wrote later, "the next it was a hot 
haze.” 

A rock tripped him and he fell sprawl¬ 
ing. Luckily he had hit a hollow. The bul¬ 
lets were flying overhead. As long as he 
stayed pinned to the ground he would be 
all right. But he still had a hundred feet 
to run before he was really safe. 


Ue lay there for what seemed an awful 
long time. Then he heard the chatter 
of machine guns again. The Frenchman 
had cut loose. This was Genes’ cue to 
run. In the confusion they both made it, 
though bullets grazed Gene’s hand and 
shoulder. 

"Whoever or whatever looks after news¬ 
papermen was in there pitching that day,” 
Gene noted. 

Gene returned from the jungle front 
shortly before the ominous Singapore 
strikes started. More than ever the city 
seemed to him to wallow in dangerous 
opium dreams. The rubber boom was 
over but nobody wanted to know it. Life 
was a frenzied round of pleasure, excite¬ 
ment and every type of vice. 

But worst of all, Symonds thought, was 
the steady forward push of the commu¬ 
nists, even though they were officially 
outlawed. Camouflaged as a non-commie 
"action party" they seemed to be getting 
ready for some drastic action. 

It started with a flurry of strikes which 
hit Singapore on May 1, 1955. Rabble 
rousers worked hard to whip up the popu¬ 
lace with promises of violence. "There 
will have to be bloodshed,” they ranted. 

The Chinese owners of the paralyzed 
Hock Lee Bus Company took counter¬ 
action. They fired all strikers and replaced 
them with strike breakers. That lit the 
fuse which led to a keg of dynamite. 

The bus employees soon received rein¬ 
forcements. First, wild-eyed riffraff ooz¬ 
ing from the slums. Then students who 
set up camp across from the bus depots. 
They distributed food and money to the 
strikers. 

On May 10th, when the city’s buses, 
operated by strike breakers, were ready 
to run on a normal schedule again, the 
strikers formed a barrier five men deep 
to keep the vehicles from leaving the de¬ 
pot. Taking a> hand for the first time, 
police turned waterhoses on the human 
streetblock. Eight demonstrators were 
hurt by flying paving stones churned up 
by the high-pressure jets. 

"Kill the police!” the rabble screamed. 

The buses went out but next day strik¬ 
ers were again massed before the depot 
driveways. Again the waterhoses went 
into action, but this time the raging mob 

66 



winner's 

circle 


by DAVID CREWE 

Several years ago, a race 
horse called Dry Moon won 
an important race. He was 
disqualified, however, be¬ 
cause even though he had 
won first place—the jockey 
who rode him was dead! Ex¬ 
aminations by medical ex¬ 
perts indicated that he had 
suffered a heart attack during 
the race. And, in accordance 
with the rules of racing in 
some states, a jockey must 
weigh in at the start of a race 
-—and also at the finish. Con¬ 
sequently, Dry Moon was dis¬ 
qualified. 

• 

Back in 1910, at the Lex¬ 
ington, Kentucky race track, 
a race horse by the name of 
Muzetta W. barrelled across 
the finish line and paid an 
astounding $830.70 for a 
$2.00 ticket! 

At Pimlico, in 1913, Corn 
Broom paid $301.60 for a 
$2.00 place ticket! 


hurled paving stones back at the police, 
injuring several dozen of them. 

During the night and following day 
Red agitators kept fanning the flames of 
hatred and hysteria at mass meetings 
throughout the city. This was May 12th, 
the day of the freak lightning bolt, to 
become known as "Black Thursday,” be¬ 
cause of the violence that marked it. 
Singapore’s British police chief, Nigel 
Morris, was beginning to show signs of 
nervousness. When several thousand hood¬ 
lums, secret society members and more 
students reinforced the chanting, jumping 
mobs at the depot. Chief Morris’ men 
tossed tear gas bombs at them. 

By noon, the strikers at the depot and 
thousands of sympathizers spilled over 
into nearby areas, particularly Alexandra 
Road, a broad, tree-lined thoroughfare. 


"They are moving about the area like 
a cyclone,” John Carlove, an American 
friend of Gene’s and a fellow''newsman, 
reported. "They are' hurling rocks at the 
police, sacking shops and wrecking cars. 
The injured run into hundreds.” 

Yet Singapore’s British governor. Sir 
John Nicholl, ensconced in the ginger¬ 
bread Government House, still backed 
Police Chief Nigel Morris in his refusal 
to use anything more lethal than tear 
gas, and that only if it was unavoidable. 

In the afternoon Gene Symonds cabled 
the New York United Press office that 
the situation was beginning to get out of 
hand. Police were powerless to stop the 
hundreds of gangsters, waterfront thugs 
and students moving into the area by 
truck. When dark fell, the stream of re¬ 
inforcements swelled to a roaring flood. 

Most of the time Gene Symonds was 
out in the streets, periodically dropping 
in to his office. At dinner time he went 
to the American Club for a much-needed 
drink and a bite, to eat. 

He was gulping his coffee when an 
American correspondent joined him. He 
had just tried to get to the riot scene at 
Alexandra Road but police had turned 
him back because of the danger. 

"This trouble could spread all over the 
island,” the newsman said. 

"Island?” Gene retorted wearily. "It 
could spread all over the world.” 


|Je phoned Wee Kim Wee at the of- 
■■ fice. Legmen had reported that the 
fires raging in the riot area were out. of 
control. Residents were fleeing. 

"I’ll have to go to the spot and see for 
myself what’s going on and maybe take 
some pictures,” Symonds told Wee. 

The Chinese pleaded with him. "Don’t. 
It’s too dangerous—” 

Symonds cut him short. "People back 
home ought to know what’s going on 
here. It’s my job to tell them.” 

He phoned Peggy MacDonald, a blond 
Australian beaut singing in a Singapore 
nightclub; he had a date with her that 
night. 

"Sorry, Peggy. Can’t make it tonight. 
I’ve got to work. Be careful—keep off the 
streets as much as you can.” Gene left 
the American Club. 

The sky over the city flickered blood- 
red from the many fires. A police truck 
rumbled by. It was loaded with firearms. 
At last . . . 

Just as Gene was trying to talk a cab 
driver into taking him to Alexandra Road 
several shots rang out in the distance. 

As it later leaked out, a British police 
lieutenant had fired in self-defense. A 
shrieking mob had overrun his car. To 
scare them off he had fired his gun four 
times into the air. But one of the bullets 
happened to hit a sixteen-year-old stu¬ 
dent. Luckily for the lieutenant, police 
reinforcements just then smashed their 
way to his car and rescued him. The an¬ 
gry mobs retreated, taking the dead stu¬ 
dent’s body along. 

The shots also scared the cabbie Gene 
was working on. 

"No, tuan," he said, shaking his head. 

"Too dangerous.” 


ADVENTURE 



Gene tried to flag down passing hacks 
but not one of them stopped. He started 
walking. After a couple of blocks, a cab 
whizzed up alongside him. "Tuan Sy- 
monds—” 

Gene knew the driver, Abdul Bin Ali, 
a Malayan. Ali was one of the many little 
people Gene was friendly with. He could 
always count on Ali when he needed a 
driver. 

"Alexandra Road,” Symonds told him. 

“If you promise to be careful,” Ali said. 

They only got as far as a side street 
where a police roadblock barred access 
to Alexandra Road. Gene’s press card 
didn’t impress the cops on duty. "You 
can’t pass, and that’s it,” he was told. 

Ali decided to try his luck on Delta 
Road, another street leading into Alex¬ 
andra. The British police corporal in 
charge of this roadblock knew Symonds. 
He also disliked him for being an Ameri¬ 
can and for having shown little patience 
with British colonial ways. 

"I-advise you-not to go,” the corporal 
told Gene. But when Symonds argued 
that he had a pressman’s job to do the 
official waved to his underlings to let the 
cab through. 

Ali swung around the barricade and in 
low gear continued down deserted Delta 
Road. All shop windows and house en¬ 
trances were boarded up, and the street, 
except for a light near the Alexandra Road 
intersection, was plunged in darkness. 
From around the corner came the din of 
blasts, screams and shouts, drawing 
nearer. 

Two-thirds down the block the cabbie 
stopped. He was trembling. "Tuan, this 
is too terrible. Let me take you back.” 

"Wait for me. I’ll have a look and be 
right back.” 

Just as Gene was getting out of the 
cab, several hundred howling rioters burst 
upon the nearby intersection. Stripped to 
their waists, their skins glistening with 
sweat, the crazed rabble was brandishing 
rocks, clubs, chains and blazing torches. 
Hoisting the slain student’s body above 
their heads they started marching toward 
Gene Symonds and the cab. 

pene handed the driver his business 
” card. "If anything happens take this 
to my office and you’ll get paid.” 

Then he advanced toward the threaten¬ 
ing mob. As if hypnotized by his calm and 
courage, the rioters halted in their tracks. 
Gene, .too, stopped. Hardly thirty feet 
separated him from the now hushed mob. 
For an endless fifteen or twenty seconds 
he looked the rioters straight in the eyes. 

Suddenly a cry rose from the crowd. 
Por wan sui!” (Blood for blood!) Hun¬ 
dreds of throats took up the cry. Those 
holding up the dead student shook the 
body at Gene as if it were a rag doll. Some 
fifty gesticulating thugs started forward. 

Gene stood his ground. His voice rose 
above the roar. ”1 am an American!” 

The next moment, the berserk mob fell 
on him. They hit him with chains, rocks, 
bricks and flaming torches. After he had 
crumpled to the pavement, they drove 
their heels into his face and body, and 
battered him some more. 

MAY, 1957 


For fifteen minutes the blood-crazed 
rdob battered Gene Symonds. Then as if 
suddenly tired of it they rushed toward 
the deserted cab and set it afire. A mo¬ 
ment later they swirled away, leaving the 
street calm and deserted. The whole thing 
could have been a spook but for Gene’s 
crushed body lying in a pool of blood by 
the blazing cab. 


A li had rushed back the 200 feet to the 
roadblock. The corporal busily twirl¬ 
ed his mustache as the cab driver pleaded, 
"Hurry, he needs help. You must do some¬ 
thing, or he’ll die.” 

The corporal jutted his chin. ”1 don’t 
have orders to help anybody. I only have 
orders to stay at my post.” 

When more pleas didn’t move the of¬ 
ficial, the desperate cabbie decided to go 
back to where Gene had been attacked. 
He crossed a vacant lot, then crept along 
a narrow alley leading to the scene. The 
rioters were gone, but Gene lay in his 
blood and the cab was on fire. Gene was 
moaning and stirring feebly. 

Panicky, Ali ran back to plead once 
again with the corporal. 

"Get going, or I’ll pull you in,” the 
police official barked. 

"Tuan Symonds gave me his card,” Ali 
said. "I’ll tell the people in his office—” 

That did it. The corporal now got head¬ 
quarters on his two-way radio. "Man at¬ 
tacked,” he announced but gave Delta 
Circus as the address—a mile from the 
section of Delta Road where Gene Sy¬ 
monds had been attacked. 

Not knowing of the switch in addresses 
—the corporal later would call it "an 
error”—Ali waited nervously for the am¬ 
bulance. When a half hour had elapsed, 
he once again tried to enlist the corporal’s 
help. A second radio car and two motor¬ 
cycles had come to reinforce the road¬ 
block. Couldn’t just anybody rush Gene 
Symonds to the hospital? 

"Stop bothering me,” the corporal an¬ 
swered in an official snarl. "I’ve called for 
an ambulance. It’s coming.” 

When twenty minutes later it still 
hadn’t shown-up, the corporal, red-faced 
with anger, told Ali to step on the running 
board, and show him the way to the scene. 

When the corporal reached Symonds’ 
crumpled, bleeding form he slowed, told 
Ali to get off the running board, then 
swung his car around and disappeared. 
He was back at the roadblock, smoking 
a cigarette when Ali returned there on 
foot. 

The cab driver didn’t bother any more 
with the representative of law and order. 
He told two Chinese youths with a truck 
that there was an American 200 feet 
away who needed help desperately. Could 
they drive him to the nearest hospital? 

After a few moments' hesitation, they 
lifted Symonds into the truck and started 
for the hospital at a gentle, slow crawl. 

Luckily it wasn’t far. They arrived there 
at 12:50 a.m., an hour and twenty min¬ 
utes after Gene had been attacked. 

"On admission,” an American corres¬ 
pondent reported, "Gene Symonds was in 
such a terrible condition that nurses wept 
and hardened doctors turned away. His 

67 



Learn the Working Mechanism of a “45” 

this accurate, model of a high-powered, "45” 
comes to you disassemoied with an the 
working parts ot a "45". it assembles In a 
iiffy and full instructions are included so that 
in no time at all, you'll leam working parts 
of an automatic. Comes with instructions, full 
supply of pellets and man-sized silhouette 
target. 


10 Day Free Trial 

Try it for 10 days free. If you are not 100% 
delighted simply return after 10 days for 
prompt refund of full purchase price. Don’t 
delay! Order now! Simply send $1 plus 25c 
shipping charge to: 


HONOR HOUSE PRODUCTS Dept. PA-101 
Lynbroek, N. V. 


poems wmm 


FIVE STAR MUSIC MASTERS. 620 BEACON BLDG., BOSTON. MASS. 

Free Book on Arthritis 
And Rheumatism 


HOW TO AVOID CRIPPLING DEFORMITIES 



SAIL'CLINIC Dept. 16 Excelsior Springs, Mo. 


INVENTORS 



McMORROW, BERMAN & DAVIDSON 

150-V Victor Bulldlne *" Wwhlneton I, D. C. 


LEARN PLASTICS 

















legs and arms were broken in many places, 
his ribs crushed, his jaw dislocated, his 
lungs and groin caved in and his brain 
laid bare. There wasn’t a square inch on 
his body where heels, bicycle chains and 
sticks hadn’t left a bleeding welt.” 

The wonder was that a spark of life 
was still flickering in the martyred body. 
With little hope in their hearts, the hos¬ 
pital surgeons performed a series of opera¬ 
tions. Unconscious, Gene held on through 
the night and part of next day. But by 
2:47 p.m. it was all over. 

The city was calm again. In the morn¬ 
ing, when British army units appeared in 
the streets. Reds, gangsters and students 
suddenly faded away, the buses began to 
run again and the riots were only a 
memory. 

Gene Symonds’ body was sealed in a 
metal coffin. It was taken to Singapore’s 
airport to be flown to Dayton, Ohio, his 
hometown. 

A few days later, Symonds’ body ar¬ 
rived in Dayton. Reverend E. J. A. St. 
Louis held the funeral service. In his ser¬ 
mon he praised Gene for "the compassion 
and sympathy he had shown for the under¬ 
privileged, ravished and war-torn people 
he met and wrote about.” From Dayton, 
Gene’s body was taken to nearby Lima 


where he was buried beside his mother’s 
grave. 

By then a few people in high positions 
were aroused. Lampson Berry, United 
States. Consul General in Singapore, had 
cabled the- State Department that the 
Singapore police would most likely be 
found blameless—he knew the sort of 
police it was. 

Informed of the cable. Gene’s boss, 
Frank H. Bartholomew, president of 
United Press, indignantly protested to Sec¬ 
retary of State Dulles, charging Gene had 
come to his death "because Singapore 
police were guilty of a flagrant breach 
of duty.” 

Senators and Congressmen now took up 
the cudgel. Senator George H. Bender of 
Ohio accused, "The Singapore authorities 
did their job shabbily. They were derelict 
in their duty. We ought to insist on a 
searching investigation.” Chairman James 
P. Richards of the House Foreign Affairs 
Committee demanded "that the State De¬ 
partment take energetic action to get to 
the bottom of this.” Senator A. S. Mike 
Monroney said, "We must insist on pro¬ 
tection of our correspondents and greater 
diligence on the part of foreign police.” 

The irate lawmakers might as well have 
saved their breafhs—or taken more drastic 


COLLAR OF GOLD CONTINUED FROM PAGE 43 


An entering wedge and driven between 
this strange alliance one autumn morn¬ 
ing when Perry Blythe came walking 
toward the hoisting cage with a black 
and tan dog cradled in his arms. 

Sean Donahue was in a dark mood. 
He had drunk hard and late the night 
before and had missed breakfast. "And 
what’s that blasted dog doing here?” he 
called from the waiting group. 

Perry Blythe smiled. His eyes softened 
as he petted the dog and it nuzzled his 
arm. "This is Lucy K, boys,” he said 
proudly. "Only a year old, but smart as 
they come.” He smiled again. "We can 
stand a bit of company, Sean. Ah, yes 
indeed.” 

Sean scowled. "Not that kind. I don’t 
like dogs. Never did.” 

A voice in the back hooted, "Now if 
you had brought that new barmaid from 
Cason’s, Perry, then Sean would not be 
complaining.” 

Perry ignored their gibes and stopped 
on the cage. Sean spoke sharply, ”1 say 
no dogs. No damn dogs, Perry Blythe.” 

The little Welshman did not flinch be¬ 
fore Sean’s black-eyed stare. "Then you’ll 
have to work it alone," he said quietly. 
"Don’t be scared, old girl,” he said to 
the dog. Sean swore behind them. 

But when the cage had dropped them 
deep into the earth and Perry and the dog 
had walked far up the main entry to the 
maze of laterals and then to the face of 
the coal the flickering light from his hel¬ 
met lamp showed Sean at work. His great 
arms attacking the coal face as though it 
were his enemy and at the sight Perry 
smiled to himself. He put the dog on a 
blanket out of harm’s way and moved in 
shoulder to shoulder with Sean. 


At piece time they had not spoken, but 
then Lucy K saw to that. She edged un¬ 
seen at- Sean’s elbow and her white teeth 
chomped a neat semi-circle from Sean’s 
bread-and-cold beef sandwich. Sean roared 
and backhanded a swing that missed the 
dog and swung him over backward. He 
glared and shook a fist at the dog who 
had run to Perry’s arms for protection. 
"Keep her out of my way," he warned 
and. cut the air with a vicious swing. "And 
out of my bucket or I’ll tend to her.” 

Perry frowned, stroking the dog’s head. 
"She’s still learning, still young, Sean. 
Sorry I am all the same.” He grasped the 
handle of his pick. Very softly he said, 
"This dog means much to me. Lucy K, 
named for my wife dead these four years.” 
His eyes hooded over and his knuckles 
showed white on the pick handle. "If harm 
should come to her, to Lucy K—” He 
looked at the pick, then at Sean. 

No harm came to Lucy K. Not-from 1 
Sean or from anyone else as fall gave way 
to winter and on to April sunlight that 
quivered jagged shadows over the weath¬ 
ered boards of the mine tipple. Only with 
great patience had Sean endurtd the frisky 
Lucy K who had sore beset him, stealing 
into his bucket and leaping at him in a 
futile effort to make friends with him. 

Then one day when Sean was catching 
a snooze at the noon break and Perry 
was gone on a trip to the sump the dog, 
left behind, had crawled up and planted 
herself in Sean’s folded arms, awakening 
him. Tentatively, seeing Perry gone, Sean 
poked out a heavy forefinger. I,ucy K’s 
red tongue licked back her gratitude. "All 
right, you little bitch,” Sean said gruffly. 
She whimpered, seeming to sense his 
oblique approval. He felt at her head and 


action. There was an investigation in Sin¬ 
gapore, a joke of an investigation. 

All it did was whitewash the police. 
Chief Nigel Morris ruled that his men, 
including the corporal at the roadblock, 
had done their duty. The wrong steer 
given the ambulance was lightly dismissed 

Two weeks later, perhaps as a result of 
American pressure, Chief Nigel Morris’ 
finest did arrest two men for Gene Sy- 
mpnds' murder, the twenty-five-year-old 
truck driver, Ong Ah Too, and the thirty- 
one-year-old professional thug, Suppiah 
Wall. The first was found in possession 
of Gene’s camera, the second of Gene’s 
wristwatch. 

Three witnesses, among them a deaf 
mute and a Chinese photographer, testi¬ 
fied they had seen -the suspects beat, kick 
and then rob Symonds. The British court 
acquitted the thug and sentenced the truck 
driver to the gallows. But on November 
30, 1955, when things had cooled off. suf¬ 
ficiently, Singapore’s governor. Sir John 
Nicholl, squashed the death sentence, 
which made both suspects go scot-free. 

One Singapore newsman said out loud 
what many thought: "Communists and 
some governors just are -no credit to the 
human race.” ■ ■ 


back. "Soft and hard.” He chuckled. "Just 
like your master.” He flung her away and 
feigned sleep as he heard Perry coming. 

Through his closed eyelids the gleam of 
Perry’s lamp hung like a red curtain be¬ 
tween them. He started as he heard 
Perry shout, "A rat, Lucy! Get him, girl!” 
Sean opened his eyes in time to see the 
lumpy, gray rat dart away with Lucy K 
in pursuit. Her excited yiping faded in the 
direction of the main shaft. Sean looked at 
Perry whose head was cocked listening. 
"One of these days,” he prophesied, 
"your damn dog will get herself lost. Or,” 
he added, "I suppose she knows the mine 
by now better than you or I.” 

"She will find her way back.” Perry 
nodded. "Any time I would bet on her 
for that.” He blew out his lamp and 
unscrewed the bowl. "She’s one in a 
million, Sean. One .in—” 

He stopped, his gray eyes widening on 
Sean at a low, rumbling noise arising 
from the sighs and groans of the shifting 
earth overhead. Ahead of them one mine 
prop, then another toppled with rifle-shot 
echoes that sang over the noise. Sean was 
on his feet. He nodded and they turned 
to run further into the mine just as the 
roof behind them fell in. It came with a 
soft, sighing sound that pinned Perry at 
the legs and sent Sean sprawling. Then 
there was only the quiet and the darkness. 

Sean’s hand groped at his head. Both 
his cap and his lamp were gone, scat¬ 
tered God knew where along the passage 
or buried in the fall. He felt his way on 
hands and knees until his reaching hands 
felt the top of a boot, then coarse, sticky- 
wet cloth. 

“Perry!” he shouted. He tore at the 
rock and earth about his partner’s legs 


ADVENTURE 


as the weak voice above him said calmly, 
"One leg, Sean. It’s like to be busted I'm 
for thinking.” 

When Sean had freed Perry’s legs he 
helped him back, then laid him down. 
He slumped on his knees beside him. 
"Well.” He spat. "We may be for it. Our 
air is cut off. That we know. Just hope 
that the pumps are not out beyond and 
the water gets here ahead of a rescue 
party.” He laughed harshly. "There may 
be rock enough down to take them days—” 
he broke off. "A tight squeeze, mate.” 

"Without lamps we’d be fools to try 
and move from here,” Perry answered. 
His breath caught sharply. "As if I could 
anyway.” 

"Damn, man!” Sean smacked his fists 
hard together. "You think I’d leave you? 
What kind of a mate have you had these 
ten years, Perry Blythe?” In the quiet, 
musty smell of dirt and sulpher and 
sweat his voice crackled. "We’re for this 
together. Like always.” 

It was still then for a long time, each 
man close with his own thoughts that 
1 and balanced their chances that 
l further 
. Then 
:, listen- 

NS ,” he said. There was no answer. 
His reaching fingers found the other man’s 
wrist, the steady pulse beat. Sean sighed. 
He's passed out, he told himself. The 
pain from his leg. Ah, Sean, he thought, 
it’s hell to sit here alone. The damned 
waiting and not knowing what’s to come. 

Then he froze, the long hairs on his 
neck prickling as something squealed ter¬ 
ribly close and something warm and wet 
touched at his face. "Rat!” he screamed. 
He clutched the squirming body beneath 
his chin. Before his powerful hands could 
squeeze he heard it, the muffled bark of 


dimmed as each passing second fu 
staled the air within their prison. 


Lucy K. He held her before his face 
and he laughed in relief, unmindful of 
her licking tongue as his thoughts sud¬ 
denly leaped with hope reborn. If Lucy K 
had got through, then somewhere in the 
dark beyond was at least a hole. No 
matter how small that hole would bring 
them air enough to stay alive until rescue 
came. 

Now Sean worked swiftly. He removed 
his shoelaces and made of them one short 
length. One end he knotted to Lucy K’s 
collar, the other he took between his teeth. 
Luck K strained at the improvised leash 
wanting to reach Perry’s still form. 

"Easy, girl,” Sean coaxed, "We’'ll not 
leave your master, never fear.” He 
dropped and worked his body beneath the 
thin body of his partner. Then, balancing 
him as he crouched low on hands and 
knees, he spoke between clenched teeth to 
Lucy K. "Home now, girl.” 

She did not budge and Sean’s heart 
sank. Would she obey him, the man who 
had always professed to hate her? "Home. 
Home, in the name of God, old girl,” he 
begged, "and if you will, there’ll be a 
collar of solid ■ gold for you for Sean 
Donahue is a man of his word.” 


^Phe slack line quivered, then ran taut 
" and the strange procession inched for¬ 
ward into the blackness; into the twisting, 
unknown path to safety that only Lucy 
K could find. 

After Lucy K, Perry Blythe’s mongrel 
dog, died they hung her solid gold collar 
behind the bar in Cason’s tavern. It hangs 
there still, as out of place now as it seemed 
then on the black and tan neck of Lucy K, 
except to those who can best understand— 
the men who have dug coal and have 
known the taste of fear alone in the dark¬ 
ness of the pits. ■ ■ 



“I was hoping he wouldn’t be missed.” 


MA6NIFYIHG GLASSES 


FOR FOLKS OVER 40 



A Blessing for Elderly folks. 
y Co U m r „',“” k, sa,U f d .hi'„ 0 „ r fluarantced^Beat* SHS* 

Dept. 437-H _Rochelle. III. 


SONGWRITERS 


URGE RECORDING COMPANY WANTS NEW SONGS! Yoursone 
may be chosen lor recording on ROYALTY BASIS. NATIONAL 
SALES. PROMOTION. DISTRIBUTION If selected. Send songs, 
song poems lor FREE examination. NO CHARGE FOR MELODIES. 
MUSIC MAKERS. Dept. AM-9 Box 2507, HOLLYWOOD. CALIF. 



O. C. NOVELTY CO.. Dept. 2 
1311 W. MAIN, OKLAHOMA CITY 4, OKLA. 




MAY, 1957 


69 












































THE DEADLY BLEND continued from page 17 


"Thank you,” she answered and took 
the oblong bundle from him. "Oh, wait.” 

His eyes followed as she moved around 
the room looking for her pocket book. 
Some guys, his expression might have 
said, have all the luck. Eva Warriner 
couldn’t have been more than five years 
older than himself, and he was only 
twenty. Wasn’t that a dainty dish to set 
before a king . . . ? he thought. 

He thanked her politely for the tip— 
she had found her purse on the outsized 
bar in the corner—and left. 


|M|rs. Warriner put the package <:are- 
fully on the coffee table, examined 
it. The postmark was an obscure town in 
Kentucky; it had been mailed five days 
before. Five days ago—Saturday. She and 
Phil Ward had been week-ending with 
the Franklins. So much for that. 

She lifted the phone and dialed. 

"It’s here,” she said. Her face showed 
some animation for the first time that 
day. "No. He won’t be home for another 
hour. Do come down, darling,” she 
purred. "I’m a little jittery: And for 
heaven’s sake use the stairs.” 

She put the phone down and went into 
the bedroom. Standing in front of the 
full-length mirror she raised a hand to 
adjust an already perfect coiffure, straight¬ 
ened out imaginary wrinkles in her 
negligee, examined makeup, skin and 
features for possible flaws. Her hand 
dropped wearily. Everything was perfect.. 
Even that was boring. 

Only when the doorbell rang for the 
second time that afternoon did Eva War¬ 
riner come to life. 

"Donny,” she breathed, and admitted 
the young man to the apartment. "Did 
anyone see you?” 

"Darling,” he said. "You ask me that 
every time. And every time the answer 
is ’no.’ Emphatically no.” 

He was a shade too blond, a shade too 
manicured, too blatantly young and 
healthy to be quite real. One suspected 
forces other than nature at work on this 
immaculate appearance. Together they 
looked incongruously out of place, as 
though they had just stepped out of a 
gilded drawing room drama of the 
thirties. 

"So. Today’s the day, is it.” He looked 
at her closely. "Nervous? Scared?” 

She shook her head. "No. As long as 
I don’t have to . . . have to ... do 
anything about it.” 

He laughed. "Darling,” he said smugly, 
"the minute your alcoholic husband sees 
that bottle of fine old Kentucky bourbon, 
he’ll dive right into it. You don’t even 
have to touch the bottle.” 

Eva Warriner shivered slightly. 

"Are you sure it’s all right, Donny? 
Are you sure we won’t . . .” 

"Won’t get caught? Not a chance. 
Look. I bought the bottle in one town, 
the poison in another, and mailed it from 
a third town that wasn’t even near my 
itinerary. Besides, I don’t even know you 
and dear Phil Warriner . . .’’ 


"Don’t talk about hirrt that way, 
please,” she begged. "Even if—well, even 
if this does come off. He’s been good 
to me.” 

"Too good, Eva darling, too good. 
You can't stand good men, can you?” He 
looked around the apartment. Money and 
taste cried out at him from every corner, 
every piece of furniture. “Get fed up 
with the good life, don’t you Eva dear?” 
he asked mockingly. 

"I can’t help it, Donny. I don’t know 
what’s wrong with me. Back in the old 
carney days I’d have died for a setup like 
this. Phil offered me everything I ever 
wanted. Including kindness—and love. I 
should be very happy. You’re not good for 
me,” she added wryly, "I know that 
much.” 

"But you can’t help yourself. Poor 
little Eva. Look at yourself for a change. 
You don’t want kindness and love. You 
want excitement.” 

She nodded mutely. 

"As for my not being good to you,” 
he continued, "I’m probably not. So 
what?” 

Suddenly she put her arms around him 
and clung to his body like a desperate, 
lost creature. 

"Afterwards?” she whispered. "What 
will happen?” 

"Afterwards,” he said, "it’s all gravy 
without any worries. Life—excitement- 
travel. One good shot of Donny’s special¬ 
ly mixed bourbon and he’s out like a 
light.” 

"The police,” she said. 

"A man as wealthy as Phil,” said 
Donny, "naturally has enemies, hasn’t 
he? All rich men do, don’t they? He loves 
his liquor, it’s no secret. And you’ve 
played the loving wife for three years, 
haven’t you? You’ve never been to Ken¬ 
tucky, have you? You don’t know any¬ 
thing about his business or business 
troubles do you? Don’t worry about the 
police, Eva darling. They’ll be toiling in 
the vineyards of commerce, looking for 
someone with a grudge against your ’late’ 
husband. And when it’s all over . . .” 
He caressed her lightly, and chuckled. 
"Waiting,” said Donny, "will be the 
hardest part.” 

A key was inserted in the door. They 
froze. Panic jumped between them like 
electricity. 

"He’s early,” she whispered. "Oh, God, 
he’s early.” 

"Where?” he said wildly. "Where can 

I . . .? 

Quickly she led him to the windows. 

"There. Orf the window sill. Behind the 
drape. Hurry! Oh, hurry!” 


lie stood on the sill, concealed, and 
looked down sixteen flights through 
the open window. But life had put him in 
many precarious spots and all he felt 
was an exhiliration. It would be worth 
it all. In the end it would be well worth it. 

"Phil, darling. You're early.” Eva had 
been something of a quick-change artist 
in her day. 


"Had an annoying directors’ meeting,” 
Phil Warriner had a pleasant, deep voice. 
"I decided to come home and relax be¬ 
fore the show tonight.” 

"Nothing wrong, I hope?” she asked 
casually. 

"Nothing that can’t be fixed easily.” 
He laughed. "You’re not to worry about 
those things, darling. Such a beautiful 
young woman,” he said softly, "should be 
immune to business worries.” He kissed 
her lightly. 

"You spoil me, Phil.” 

"I married you for that privilege. And 
for other reasons, too deep and numerous 
to mention.” 

"You’ve been good to me, Phil.” 

"Don’t sound so sad a^out it, sweet¬ 
heart'. It has been my pleasure.” He made 
a sweeping bow. "Hi! What’s this?” 

"That?” Her voice trembled slightly. 
She fought for -control. "Oh, that’s a 
package that came for you today. From 
Kentucky. Who do you know in Kentucky, 
Phil?” 

”1 know thousands of people in Ken¬ 
tucky, darling. Millions, maybe. Are there 
a million people in Kentucky?” He ex¬ 
amined the postmark. "I never heard of 
this place, though. Well, let’s see.” 

He was childishly eager about gifts. 
His strong fingers tore at the outer wrap¬ 
pings until the bottle of Kentucky’s finest 
bourbon stood revealed. 

"Well!” He picked up the paper, looked 
at the postmark again. "No card. Now, 
who do you suppose?” He was pleased. 
We’ll have to drink a toast to our un¬ 
known friend.’ 

"Now?” she asked breathlessly. 

"Why not?” He looked at her, noted 
the terrified expression. "Don’t worry, 
honey,” he said gently, "I won’t get tight 
before we- go out.” She shook her head 
numbly. 

"I forgot,” he said. "You don’t like 
bourbon. Okay. Scotch for you, bourbon 
for me. all right?” 

He opened the bottle of bourbon, sniffed 
appreciatively at the contents. 

"Perfect,” he said, and poured a gen¬ 
erous shot into a Manhattan glass. 

"Salut!” he cried and looked at her. 
She was staring, transfixed, at the window. 
The drapery was billowing out. There 
seemed to be a convulsive movement 

"What’s that?” he asked. "Is there 
something behind . . 

A high, rasping shriek cut him off. 
It faded in the distance. 

"What was it?” Phil Warriner asked. 
"It sounded like . . .” 

"Donny,” Eva whispered. "Donny!’’ 
She sank to the floor in a faint. 

"Darling! Eva! What’s going on around 
here, anyway!” Phil Warriner suddenly 
realized that his wife had fainted and 
that he held an untasted drink in his 
hand. 

He almost ran over to her. 

"Here, darling, here. Drink this.” 

All solicitude and concern, he lifted 
her head and poured the bourbon down 
her throat. ■ ■ 


70 


ADVENTURE 


THE INCREDIBLE STEEL-TEETH MURDERS 

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 35 


infrequently for water and for fresh 
meat; the island was overrun with herds 
of wild cattle, pigs, asses, dogs, and cats 
which were descendants of animals im¬ 
ported by the previous settlers. The 
couple had the comforting knowledge 
that if they wanted to send a message to 
the outside world all they had to do was 
put a note in the barrel and sooner or 
later it would be picked up. 

This Eden they christened Friedo, 
meaning Garden of Peace. Over the next 
two years they built two houses there, the 
first a temporary affair of acacia and 
heartwood and the second a permanent 
structure of cemented lava blocks, octa¬ 
gonal in shape and with a domed roof. 
All in all they were succeeding beyond 
their fondest expectations, the principal 
drawback being hordes of mosquitoes and 
other insects during the rainy seasons. 


T hen Friedrich made what in retrospect 
was an incredible error. He was 
making good progress on a philosophical 
book, and from time to time he wrote 
long letters to friends in Germany telling 
them of the idyllic life he and Dore were 
living. Some’ of these letters reached the 
newspapers, which published sensational 
"Adam and Eve” stories. Soon each pass¬ 
ing ship brought mail from "like-minded 
souls" who wanted to settle on Floreana 
and let the rest of the world go by. 
Enthusiastic colonists began to arrive. 

Most of them could not stand either 
the work or the solitude. In a single 
month, five would-be colonists decided 
that the Adam or Eve life was not for 
them and left. Only one young couple— 
Arthur and Margret Wittmer—who wero 
sick of the growing tensions in Europe, 
had the fortitude to stick it out. They 
settled near a spring at some distance 
from the crater and did very well. 

At about this time Friedrich published 
his series of articles in "Atlantic 
Monthly.” The newspapers, too, were 
publicizing his Eden. One aftermath was 
the first of a series of visits by Vincent 
Astor and his luxury yacht Neurmahal. 
Another was the arrival of the phony and 
insane. Baroness Eleisa von Wagner- 
Bousquet. Almost as soon as she was 
ashore hell broke loose in Eden and con¬ 
tinued until violent death ensued. 

The Baroness gave the superficial ap¬ 
pearance of great wealth, she brought, 
with her an immense quantity of gear 
including three and one-half tons of ce¬ 
ment for housebuilding and she was obvi¬ 
ously going to stay awhile. She was a 
spectacular platinum blonde (which was 
also phony since in time her hair reverted 
to dark brown streaked with gray) in her 
mid-forties; she may have been forty- 
four but that is not certain. 

The Baroness claimed to have been 
Austrian, widowed, and a resident of 
Paris after her husband’s death. Except 
for the Paris residency, the rest was all 
bunkum. For one thing, her tableware 
bore the seven-pointed coronet of a 

MAY, 1957 


countess instead of the five-pointed coro¬ 
net of a baroness. This and other details 
indicated that her background was prob¬ 
ably that of an extremely bold adven¬ 
turess who lacked, however, the culture 
and knowledge to fool really informed 
persons. Both Friedrich and Dore saw 
through her sham almost immediately. 

The Baroness brought an entourage of 
three men with her. One of them, Robert 
Philippson, was blond, blue-eyed, and 
extraordinarily handsome in a weak sort 
of way. She addressed him as "my dar¬ 
ling” and spoke of him as "my husband,” 
but it is probable that they were not mar¬ 
ried, although he was very much in her 
favor when they arrived. 

The second man was also blond, blue¬ 
eyed, and handsome in the same weak 
sort of way. His name was Rudi Lorentz. 
He was thirty years old although he 
looked considerably younger. More is 
known about him than about Philippson 
because at various times he talked about 
his past. It appears that he possessed a 
flair for little trinkets and objets d’art of 
the sort that appeal to tpurists and that 
he had operated a little knicknack shop 
in Paris. There the Baroness—who had 
a vivid and strong personality and could 
be utterly charming when she cared to- 
had made him her virtual love-slave. He 
adored her completely, although she now 
treated him as no more than a servant. 

It was Rudi who revealed that the 
Baroness was a nymphomaniac. Accord¬ 
ing to him she had been married, but not 
to a baron. Her lust for sex conquest was 
so great that she went out with multi¬ 
tudes of men, seldom with the same one 
more than once. The husband had re¬ 
belled against this sort of thing and the 
couple had separated without benefit of 
divorce. The infatuated Rudi had not 
possessed the willpower to leave her but 
had remained with her, tolerating her in¬ 
fidelities which she made no effort to 
conceal. 

The third man was ah Ecuadorean ser¬ 
vant named Valdiviese. 


I t was soon obvious that the Baroness 
intended to rule the island with an 
iron hand. Despite the Wittmers' protests 
she started to build her house near their 
spring and also used that spring instead 
of finding one of her own. She told them 
that the island was actually hers but that 
they had her permission to remain. 

She worked Lorentz and the Ecuador¬ 
ean servant like dogs building her house 
while her favorite, Robert, did no work 
whatsoever. The house—which she named 
Hacienda Paradise—rapidly took shape; 
she did not hesitate to lash Rudi like a 
slave when he slowed down although she 
knew better than to lash Valdiviese. It 
was a good-sized affair of corrugated 
iron, garishly furnished with low divans, 
ornate rugs and wall hangings. 

Clear-cut evidence of her maniacal ob¬ 
session for power—particularly power 
over men—did not, of course, develop all 

71 



4 STAR FILMS Box 1031, Burbank ]9 Calif. 














at once. It grew like a mosaic in which a 
multitude of small pieces finally complete 
a picture. For instance, nobody on the 
island realized for a long time that the 
Baroness, using the pen-name Francke, 
was selling sensational articles to maga¬ 
zines, articles in which she built herself 
up as "The Empress of Floreana.” One 
of these articles described her plans for 
development of the island; they included 
a boulevard a mile long flanked by rows 
of banana trees and a luxury hotel to be 
named Hotel Paradise Refound. 

As the legend of the "Empress” 
spread, the Baroness received quite a few 
visits by yachts as they touched in the 
Galapagos. She went out of her way to 
impress her guests. Although she was 
living in an iron house on a remote little 
island, she never was outdoors when 
callers arrived. One of her three men al¬ 
ways acted as doorman, inquiring who 
the callers were, asking them to wait 
while he ascertained whether or not the 
Baroness would see them, etc. There is 
no evidence that any yachting party was 
ever refused an audience; the Baroness 
was too avid for homage. 

The vicious side of her nature was re¬ 
served for those in her power, both hu¬ 
man and animal, as well as for those she 
felt were attempting to infringe upon her 
rights as "Empress.” Her men—particu¬ 
larly Valdiviese who served as a paid 
bodyguard—chased away many a fishing- 
and trade-boat at gunpoint. She was par¬ 
ticularly incensed when the crews of these 
boats landed to hunt the herds of wild 
cattle and pigs, something they had done 
for many years, and she tried to extort 
tribute from them for the privilege of 
hunting. 

Like all nymphomaniacs, the Baroness' 
really hated men and was not content 
until she had first captured them emo¬ 
tionally and then subjugated them so they 
would accept any humiliation from her. 

She had fantastic theories about how 
to subjugate males and keep them sub¬ 
jugated. One was to hurt them so badly 
they became dependent on her for sur¬ 
vival itself, then nurse them tenderly. 
Demonstrating this theory to Dore, she 


shot two of the wild dogs—males—in the 
legs, crippling but not fatally wounding 
them. Then she nursed the dogs back to 
health; after that they followed her about 
slavishly although she treated them bru¬ 
tally. They were in her power and they 

"Men are like these dogs,” she told 
Dore. "Bring them down by force, then 
make them well again and they’ll stay 
with you.” It seemed to work insofar as 
Rudi—and later Robert—were concerned. 
Both, however, were obviously weak- 
willed masochists. 

The already bad situation became much 
worse after the Baroness succeeded in 
captivating a handsome and youthful 
Danish fisherman by the name of Arends, 
who had visited the island frequently. 
She probably fascinated him by her tales 
of life in the great capitals of Europe, 
her own great wealth, and how he might 
accompany her there some day. In any 
event Arends got rid of his crew of a 
couple of native Indians, tied up his boat, 
and moved into the Baroness’ big double 
bed, ousting Robert. Now Robert worked 
as hard as Rudi while Arends was the 
one who did no work and when Robert 
protested he got the same treatment as 
Rudi had been receiving—contemptuous 
and vicious whippings. 

In mid-1933 three more men arrived to 
visit the Baroness. One was a young 
German journalist who had an assign¬ 
ment to do a feature story on the self 
styled "Empress”; by that time the rumor 
was widespread that i motion picture, to 
be titled "The Empress of Floreana,” was 
to be filmed on the island with her play¬ 
ing the lead role. The second man was a 
young and handsome friend of the jour¬ 
nalist who was tall, athletic, very blond, 
and very blue-eyed. The third man was 
an Ecuadorean in the employ of the 
Germans. 

True to form, the Baroness went all- 
out for the handsome blond. Her wiles, 
her seductive posturing, her sexy talk 
made no impression on him whatsoever; 
to him she was just an erotic but aging 
hag. The day when one of the island 
boats was expected to pick up the visitors 


drew close. The Baroness came to a de¬ 
cision. She would treat the young blond 
in the same way she had treated the wild 
dogs; shoot him but not fatally and then 
nurse him back to health. By that time 
he would be her love-slave. 


O f course, it had to appear like an ac¬ 
cident. But the Baroness was adept at 
staging accidents. She suggested a hunt 
for a tender, fat calf; one she would per¬ 
sonally select. Reaching a point where 
the herd might be expected to appear, she 
dispersed the hunters carefully and with 
malice aforethought. On the left were 
the two Germans, their Ecuadorean, and 
Arends. In the center was Robert. On the 
right was the Baroness. Rudi wasn’t pres¬ 
ent; he hadn’t been invited. 

The cattle showed as expected. The 
hunters waited for the Baroness to signal 
her choice. Suddenly she signaled, and in 
almost the same -instant two shots rang 
out. Nobody thought any more about the 
calf, which escaped unharmed, for Arends 
was obviously hit, and hit badly. He was 
staggering and holding his abdomen, and 
in a moment he crumpled to the ground. 

The male hunters rushed to the fallen 
man. "My God! Arends is shot!” one of 
them called to the Baroness, 

"Who, Arends ?” she called back, as 
though disbelievingly. She came over to 
the group. "Who shot him?” she asked 
accusingly. 

It turned out that, of all the men, only 
the Ecuadorean had fired, and at the 
calf. The others, slower to understand 
the signal, had not had time to fire. The 
Baroness, however, had fired her shotgun. 

Arends, shot in the abdomen, needed 
immediate medical attention. The Baron¬ 
ess said that she would take care of him, 
but the Germans insisted on summoning 
Friedrich, a man known to be an M.D. 
Friedrich found that the wound had been 
inflicted by a shotgun fired from some 
distance and not by a rifle. Only the 
Baroness had been armed with a shotgun. 

To Friedrich, it was obviously no acci¬ 
dent but a deliberate shooting. For one 
thing, the Baroness had fired parallel to 
the herd of cattle, not at them. She was 
an expert shot. But why had she shot at 
Arends, her current favorite? 

Then a curious point came up. Just be-' 
fore the signal was called, Arends had 
been standing several feet to the right 
and to the rear of the handsome young 
blond. Almost as the Baroness had looked 
toward the herd and pointed out the tar¬ 
get he had stepped swiftly forward, plac¬ 
ing himself directly between her and the 
blond. Expecting a volley, she had fired 
very quickly, without realizing until after 
the shot that Arends had moved in the 
way. 

The Baroness had to admit the shoot¬ 
ing; in fact she threw her shotgun away 
with every indication of remorse. She 
tried to give the impression that she had 
slipped or that something had suddenly 
alarmed her, causing her to wheel just as 
she fired. Apparently nobody questioned 
her explanation, although nobody be¬ 
lieved it. Friedrich gave Arends excellent 
care until a vessel arrived about a week 



72 


ADVENTURE 







later and took the patient to a hospital 
in Guygaquil, where he made an Unevent¬ 
ful recovery. But Arends had had enough 
of the Baroness; he didn't come back to 
Floreana except to retrieve his fishing 
boat. 

The Germans and the two Ecuadoreans 
departed on the same island boat with 
the wounded Arends. 

With the visitors all gone, tension be¬ 
gan to increase rapidly. Rudi, who ap¬ 
parently had given up all hope of ever 
being restored to the Baroness’ favor, was 
beginning to show evidences of despera¬ 
tion—long periods of silence followed by 
raucous laughter, ranting threats, sob¬ 
bings and weepings. He pleaded with her 
for enough money to get him back to 
France, or at least to the mainland. She 
told him bluntly that Arends had stripped 
her of money and that until she earned 
more from her writing she could not help 
him leave. He then asked for his personal 
belongings so that he could go elsewhere 
on the island, perhaps move in with the 
Wittmers, with whom he was friendly, 
but she refused because she wanted to 
keep him under her control and working 
for her. She now kept his things locked 
in a closet to which she alone had a key. 

There is no doubt that she was finan¬ 
cially rocky. Both Robert and Rudi were 
going about in rags. She was also getting 
panicky. Previously she had been a tee¬ 
totaler, but now when yachts were in the 
harbor she played the part of a water¬ 
front barfly, telling elaborate yarns for 
free drinks. 

By early March of 1934 the situation 
had reached the exploding point. One 
day Rudi frantically demanded his things 
■so that he could go away; he was shaking 
and sobbing. The Baroness let loose a 
torrent of abuse, calling him among other 
things a "spawn,” a "dog,” and a "low- 
down "bastard." Rudi snatched up a chair 
and smashed at the closet lock with it. 
Robert, who up to now had been standing 
by laughing, promptly moved in and 
clobbered him over the head with what¬ 
ever implement was handy; it knocked 
Rudi out cold. When he revived he was 
outside Hacienda Paradise, his body a 
mass of bruises from head to toe; the 
Baroness had beaten him almost to death 
with the riding whip. He crawled to 
Friedrich's; the journey, interspersed by 
lapses into unconsciousness, took him two 
days. Friedrich and Dore fed him and 
nursed him as best they could. After 
awhile he left, saying that he was going 
to the Wittmers, that they would take 
him in for awhile. He reached the Witt¬ 
mers and they gave him a place to stay. 


%A#hat happened after that can only be- 
■■ conjectured, because there were no 
survivors, at least, for long. The date was 
March 19, 1934. It was the custom of the 
settlers to take a noon siesta, and Fried¬ 
rich and Dore were dozing when they 
heard a single piercing shriek that was 
abruptly cut off. The sound came from 
Hacienda Paradise. The couple did not 
bother to investigate, for screams, oaths, 
and the sounds of beatings were common¬ 
place at the Baroness’ place. 

MAY, 1957 


Several days went by. There was quiet 
at Hacienda Paradise, and neither the 
Baroness nor Robert was seen by any¬ 
body. Rudi showed up at various times at 
both the Wittmers’ and Friedrich’s. For 
the first time since he had landed on the 
island he seemed relaxed, even jubilant. 
His customary hangdog attitude was gone 
Asked if he had succeeded in getting back 
in the Baroness’ favor he replied in the 
negative, but added that he had told her 
off "once and for all.” 


ay after day the strange quiet persisted 
at Hacienda Paradise. Only Rudi was 
seen. Again pobody bothered to investi¬ 
gate, for the Baroness was not only dis¬ 
liked, she was loathed. But everybody 
was becoming suspicious that something 
drastic had happened, and Rudi—who by 
nature was more amiable than bright- 
realized this. He went to the Wittmers 
with a brand-new story. 

Briefly, he said that a magnificent 
yacht had put into Postoffice Bay, carry¬ 
ing a party of nobility, including some of 
the Baroness’ closest friends. These peo¬ 
ple had persuaded the Baroness and 
Robert to return to Europe with them. 
Robert, it seemed, was still in her favor. 
As a parting gesture, she had "be¬ 
queathed” Hacienda Paradise to Rudi. 

This could have been true. Postoffice 
Bay could not be seen from any of the 
homes on the island and nobody kepi a 
lookout for incoming vessels; when resi¬ 
dents wanted to be contacted for any 
reason they left a message in the ancient 
barrel. Separate trails led to each of the 
landholdings. A party could easily have 
landed, picked up the Baroness and Rob¬ 
ert and their personal belongings, and 
left without being heard or observed. 

In money, of course, Rudi was no 
richer than before. And he still wanted to 
leave Floreana. He had put a notice in 
the barrel begging to be picked up by the 
first passing ship, but he had no cash for 
passage and whether or not he would be 
carried on charity was a nice question. 
He went to the Wittmers and Friedrich 
and Dore, asked if they might be inter¬ 
ested in buying any of the things the 
Baroness had left behind. They were and 
went with him to Hacienda Paradise. 

Immediately they knew that something 
was very wrong. All the Baroness' and 
Robert’s clothing was still at Hacienda 
Paradise; apparently they had taken 
nothing with them. 

It was still possible that the Baroness 
and Robert had left with just the clothing 
on their backs; all their garb was badly 
worn, patched, and deteriorated by 
weather and insects. But there were more 
sinister signs that they had not left of 
their own free will. 

The favorite book of the Baroness had 
been Oscar Wilde’s "Portrait of Dorian 
Gray,” a morbid psychological tale of the 
deterioration of a totally evil young man. 
She had read from it almost every day. 
It still lay where she always put it down. 

On the same table lay her long ivory 
cigarette holder. Here and there were 
many photographs of her alleged rela¬ 
tives and friends; not one had been taken 



ILLUSTRATED COMIC BOOKLETS 


THE KIND ADULTS WANT 

HILARIOUS SITUATIONS, LUSTY SCENES 

30 THRILL PACKED BOOKLETS, ONLY $1.00 


ROYCO, Box 584D, Miami Beath 39, Florida 




73 

















away. None of her jewelry had vanished. 

Would the Baroness have left without 
taking with her these most personalized 
valuable possessions? The same unspoken 
answer occurred to everyone; it was, no. 

"Would she want you to sell these 
personal belongings?” Do/e asked gently. 
"Suppose she returns some day.” 

"There's no danger of that,” Rudi told 
her. "Not any more.” 

Neither the Wittmers nor Friedrich 
and Dore bought anything. Weeks and 
months dragged by with no fresh devel¬ 
opments. Then, along in June, a vessel 
put in at Postoffice Bay and when it left 
Rudi was aboard. This vessel put in at 
Santa Cruz, where he contracted with a 
Norwegian fisherman named Nuggerud 
to take him to Chatham Island, where he 
might intercept another vessel bound for 
Guayaquil. 

Disaster of some sort overtook Nug¬ 
gerud, for his boat never reached Chath¬ 
am. Instead, many months lated the des- 
sicated bodies of Rudi and Nuggerud 
were found by the crew of a California 
fishing vessel on the beach of Marchena 
Island, some miles north of Chatham. It 
appeared that the two men had been be¬ 
calmed for some time but had finally 
reached Marchena where they had gone 
ashore, possibly in search of water. Find¬ 


ing no water—for there had been a pro¬ 
longed drought that year—they had per¬ 
ished of thirst. 

Except for the Wittmers, tragedy seems 
to have struck everyone who settled on 
Floreana. Early in November, Friedrich 
developed a raging fever, took to his bed, 
went into convulsions, drummed his feet 
briefly against the foot of the handmade 
acacia bed, and died. It seems most likely 
that he was killed by eating the meat of 
an infected chicken. 

Dore buried Friedrich and returned to 
Germany as rapidly as possible, leaving 
Floreana on the first boat that put in 
after Friedrich's death. She vanished into 
oblivion during the madness and con¬ 
fusion of World War II. 


T he official investigation revealed little 
more than what has been told here. It 
did bring out the grim fact that no vessel 
had put in at Floreana at any time near 
the date Rudi had stated the Baroness and 
Robert had been picked up by a yacht. 
And since that noon when the sudden 
piercing scream was heard there has been 
no evidence of either the Baroness or 
Robert being seen alive anywhere, by 
anybody. 

The evidence is circumstantial, but 


none the less convincing, that Rudi and 
Rudi alone killed the Baroness and Rob¬ 
ert. He didn’t do it with a gun, for the 
shots would have been heard. He didn’t 
do it with a knife, for blood’ would have 
been found. It is probable that the in¬ 
strument he used was some sort of club. 

One riddle remains: What did he do 
with the bodies, which were never found? 
The best guess is that he merely dropped 
them into one of the hundreds of volcanic 
vents or pipes that honeycombed the 
craters. It was such a convenient and ob¬ 
vious solution to the problem that he 
could scarcely have overlooked it. If this 
was the case, it is probable that the 
bodies will never be recovered, even if a 
major search were made some day. And 
a search would serve no purpose, since 
all the principals are long since dead. 

So we come to tjje end of the weird 
tale of murder in the Garden of Eden, a 
tale so fantastic that even a fictioneer 
would hesitate to write it. Perhaps the 
best conclusion of all is to merely quote 
from the writings of Friedrich' Ritter, 
who said: "Paradise is only a state of the 
soul within one’s self, and it consists of 
love, patience, and contentment. These 
are truly the entrance gates of Heaven; 
since we possess all three, we do not ask 
for anything more.” ■ ■ 


THE WICKEDEST STREET IN THE WORLD continued from page 19 


Completely outraged, the Red Dean 
streaked for Scotland Yard on the banks 
of the Thames and indignantly reported 
he had. been "revoltingly propositioned” 
in the heart of London and in "almost 
broad daylight, too.” The squawk was 
nothing new to the officials of Scotland 
Yard, or for that matter, to anyone else 
who has visited the British capital during 
the last few years. 

For Piccadilly Circus in London’s ultra¬ 
fashionable West End, has boomed into 
the busiest flesh market in the world. 
Girls of every nationality, color, age and 
size, and all aggressively eager, are avail¬ 
able for hire at almost any time of the 
day. During peak hours, they swarm in 
such numbers that the Grands Boule¬ 
vards of Paris and the Avenida of Lisbon, 
notoriously overloaded with female live¬ 
stock, appear like deserted provincial 
main streets in comparison. 

Nearly all of London’s 20,000 women 
of easy virtue have at one time or another 
peddled their charms in the huge square 
and the streets leading into it. The Public 
Morality Council of London estimates that 
on an average day 7,000 to 10,000 girls 
operate openly on the streets of the square 
and its fringes. 

In this confined area mass street¬ 
walking is a $150,000,000 play-for-pay 
industry. The take is all profit with a 
minimum of overhead and the gangsters, 
pimps and small-time hoodlums all want 
a share of the gravy. As an inevitable re¬ 
sult a vicious switch-blade and razor¬ 
slashing underworld struggle for control 
of the racket has become a scandalous 
national problem. 

London’s illicit love sells for less than 


in ^my other large city in the western 
world. Of course, fees depend entirely 
upon the charms of the prostitute and 
how much she figures the traffic will 
bear. A dockside bum, for example, does 
well to get a dollar or a handful of 
change, while a Bond Street cutie with a 
luxury apartment is likely to command 
top fees of fifty dollars a performance. 

But the average Piccadilly Circus babe 
averages about five dollars a client at 
prices ranging from one to two pounds 
sterling a throw. This is about half the 
price an average boulevard troteuse in 
Paris demands and a bumpkin who of¬ 
fered an average big city prostitute in the 
United States only five dollars is apt to 
be paid off with a Bronx cheer. Yet in 
spite of the comparatively low pay Picca¬ 
dilly girls manage to bring in anywhere 
from $150 to $300 a week. 

The whopping $150,000,000 pie is 
whacked up and working areas parcelled 
out in the backrooms of the pubs of Soho, 
a mile-square area just behind Piccadilly 
and the theatre district. Once populated 
mainly by foreigners, Soho is a sprawling 
hodge-podge of bars, shady rooming 
houses and small restaurants, a made-to- 
order hangout for bookmakers and pimps 
who infest the bawdy neighborhood. 


TPhe majority of the girls are home- 
" grown talent from small towns and vil¬ 
lages who have fled to the city to escape 
country boredom. Prostitution has the 
easy-money appeal but they soon learn 
they can’t work the streets without a pro¬ 
tector. Those who rebel against giving a 
pimp from half to two-thirds of their 


earnings wind up with scarred faces that 
put them out of business altogether. 

Although most Piccadilly girls are 
native-born, a formidable imported for¬ 
eign contingent is growing rapidly. The 
British public learned a lot about the 
international white-slave racket when the 
notorious Messina Brothers’ case broke 
wide open in Brussels, Belgium. Much to 
the consternation of the English, the sen¬ 
sational expose revealed that London is 
one of the biggest white-slave markets in 
the world. 

Eugene and Louis Messina were big- 
time Soho pimps, who until the case broke 
had a sizeable stake in London’s over-all 
prostitution empire; They affected the 
speech and mannerisms of upper-class 
Englishmen and dressed conservatively in 
the latest English fashions. But procurers 
and hoodlums at heart, Scotland Yard 
records show that neither ever performed 
an honest day’s work. 

Around Soho, the brothers were never 
highly regarded as knife-men. When 
there was a slashing job to be done, they 
hired tough "tear-aways” to handle the 
dirty work. Nevertheless they prospered 
until becoming the personal targets of 
another razor-wielding clique in a juris¬ 
dictional dispute and they lammed to the 
continent for a holiday while the matter 
was being ironed out. 

The erstwhile vice-kings settled down 
in Brussels waiting for things to cool off 
in London. They had plenty of cash in 
foreign bank accounts but they weren’t 
boys to pass up a fast buck, particularly 
when they discovered a gold mine of raw 
material in the Belgian capital. The Bel¬ 
gian girls fell for their synthetic sophis- 


74 


ADVENTURE 



ticated English ways and in no time at all, 
the brothers had a steady stream of novice 
prostitutes flowing into London from 
Belgium. 

The Messinas’ system was corny but 
rarely failed to work. The slick-talking 
London pimps made a round of Brussels’ 
bars and night-clubs, spending money and 
contacting girls from seventeen to twenty- 
five years old. An insidious mixture of 
cajolery, loose sexual affairs and a taste 
of the free-spending highlife did the rest. 

The brothers wined and dined the cred¬ 
ulous girls in the city’s luxurious res¬ 
taurants and took them to their $400 a 
month penthouse on the exclusive Avenue 
Louise. Although both had wives working 
as call girls in London, the Messinas often 
proposed marriage "when we get to Lon¬ 
don” and conned their gullible playmates 
into believing English life was just one 
big bed of roses. 

The girls, overwhelmed by the style in 
which the Messinas lived in Brussels, 
swallowed the bait. They soon became 
accustomed to nice clothes, luxury living 
and the various men in the mob. When 
the brothers felt the time was right they 
proposed that the girls marry Englishmen 
to acquire British passports and nation¬ 
ality and proceed to London. There the 
bewildered young women were shunted 
into a brothel for a conditioning period 
and the husbands, often members of the 
gang, faded out of the picture. 

But the Belgian police were not asleep. 
They nabbed the Messinas on a charge of 
recruiting talent for London’s great army 
of prostitutes. After sweating it out in a 
Brussels’ clink for a few months the 
brothers showed up in court with two 
Belgian women lawyers to defend them. 

They were dismayed to find that Public 
Prosecutor Jean de Bettencourt was 
loaded with telling evidence seized in a 
police raid on the Avenue Louise pent¬ 
house. He sewed up the case by produc¬ 
ing letters written to Eugene Messina by 


London brothel keepers. One pimp en¬ 
thusiastically reported on the activities of 
a girl named Violette who had taken in 
$6,631 in six weeks’ time. He implored 
Eugene to send him more like her. 

"The Messinas,” Prosecutor Bettencourt 
told the court in his summation, "are 
notorious white-slavers of the most dis¬ 
gusting type. They are a public menace 
here and in,their homeland and it is up to 
us to remove them from circulation.” 

Oily Eugene was convicted and re¬ 
ceived a sentence of seven years in prison. 
Brother Louis got off with ten months. 
The white-slave ring was broken although 
its collapse had no perceptible effect on 
London’s freewheeling prostitution racket. 


A good many foreigners and some 
Britishers were prone to blame the 
police for the shocking conditions on 
London’s streets. Even members of Parlia¬ 
ment publicly stated that bobbies close 
their eyes to the wanton activities of the 
street-walkers. In the House of Commons, 
Home Secretary Gwilym Lloyd-George, 
son of the famous prime minister, who is 
responsible for law and order throughout 
the United Kingdom, had a hard time 
explaining why prostitutes and pimps 
were allowed to take over the city’s side- 


"What do you expect me to do?” the 
harassed Home Secretary protested plain¬ 
tively. "We can’t just pick up these people 
like so many stray dogs.” 

He reminded the House of Commons 
that in England no one is arrested on 
general principles. When a lawful charge 
is lacking, there can be no arrest and the 
truth is that while the British approach 
to vice and particularly prostitution has 
always been easy-going, English law is 
hopelessly outmoded. The bobbies’ hands 
are tied and court processes are in 
adequate to handle the problem. 

For example, it is not illegal for : 



NEW DISCOVERY 


SAVES PLUMBING BILLS 



DOMINANCE 



_ ..ANTED (16-55) 

.HIGH PAY. Earn while you 
•Travel to foreign lands. 
^Experience not required. 
'ICholce lobs: merchants, 
srachti, luxury liners, 
w freighters, etc. Adventure! 
Write for FREE Information. 

WORLD-WIDE SEAMEN'S SERVICE 
Dept, J , 309 W, 42 St., New York M, N,V, 


“I’M MAKING 
MORE THAN 

$ 1000a Month 



HAVEN’T TOUCHED BOTTOM YET!" 



Jfe™----'-- 

Wm. WydtwMl'hoaTFME No'etu/stioi! 

MERLITE INDUSTRIES, Dept. P-23T 
—114 East 32 St., New York 16, N.Y. 

I Co.. Ltd., 371 Dowd St., Montrool 1, P.Q. 


MAY, 1957 


75 





















woman to take money from a man in ex¬ 
change for her favors. Under the law, 
that is strictly a legitimate business deal. 
Soliciting men for immoral purposes is 
unlawful, but on the other hand there is 
no law against a girl asking a gentleman 
friend to come home with her. Obviously, 
proving a case of immoral solicitation in 
court isn’t the most effective method of 
curbing prostitution. 

A flagrant case of habitual soliciting is 
not a serious crime even when proven and 
under an act passed in I860, the maxi¬ 
mum fine is only two pounds, the equiv¬ 
alent of $5.60. Most girls consider the 
fine a reasonable license fee to work. 
They pay up promptly and gaily return 
to their beats to make up the lost revenue 
before they go off shift. 

The way English justice operates is il¬ 
lustrated by a recent case that aroused 
the British social conscience. The case 
inspired a vigorous campaign aimed at a 
new and growing form of organized pros¬ 
titution—the call-girl racket, which the 

76 


newspapers labeled as an idea "imported 
from the United States.” It involved two 
young women who shared a two-room 
flat in Mulberry-Close, Beaufort Street, in 
London’s Chelsea district. 

Neighbors complained that Mrs. Mau¬ 
reen O’Connor, a stunning red-haired 
twenty-eight-year-old Irishwoman, and 
Miss Elsie Mary Hughes, an equally good 
looking young English girl, were operat¬ 
ing a disorderly house. The girls would 
probably have beaten the rap if Mrs. 
O’Connor hadn’t become flustered when 
police knocked on her door and politely 
asked if it were true that they habitually 
entertained men for the purpose of re¬ 
munerative love-making. 

"Well,” replied Maureen O’Connor in¬ 
nocently, "It’s twenty-five pounds a time 
[$67.50] and I give Elsie half what she 
earns.” 

In court the arresting officers produced 
the inevitable little black book filled with 
names of well-to-do customers and Mrs. 
O’Connor admitted that other girls were 


on call when Elsie was busy. She was 
sentenced to three months in jail but re¬ 
leased on fifty pounds [$115] bail pending 
an appeal on the grounds that the officers 
hadn’t cautioned her properly. As the 
British take a dim view of self-incrimin¬ 
atory evidence obtained through what they 
consider "trickery,” chances are that 
she’ll win her case. 

But London’s Sunday “press whooped 
up the case and lambasted the call-girl 
racket as "fully as shocking as anything 
yet disclosed in America.” They reviewed 
New York’s sensational Jelke case and 
ran articles written by call-girls them¬ 
selves who said that their clientele in¬ 
cluded titled members of Britain’s aris¬ 
tocracy, politicians and businessmen. 

The widely read Reynold’s News lo¬ 
cated half a dozen call houses operated by 
"women vice bosses,” one of whom 
claimed she netted $24,000 a year clear 
profit. Another reported several call 
houses almost on the doorstep of Buck¬ 
ingham Palace, one "within one hundred 
yards of the enclosure where the Royal 
Family exercise their dogs.” 

The hubbub became so loud that Sir 
John Mott-Gower, London’s Commissioner 
of Police, hastily sent two top police of¬ 
ficials to the United States to make an 
on-the-spot study of American police tech¬ 
niques in handling vice, namely, call- 
houses. 

After a long conference with New York 
City’s Chief Magistrate, John M. Mur- 
tagh, the English visitors emerged to say 
that, "New York City provides a horrible 
example of what not to do.” Chief Magi¬ 
strate Murtagh backed them up. He said 
that New York, like most big American 
cities, takes the wrong approach to pros¬ 
titution and makes the same disgraceful 
fundamental errors that were made 
twenty years ago. 

Just what the British investigators re¬ 
ported in London hasn’t been disclosed 
but Home Secretary Lloyd-George told 
the House of Commons that the govern¬ 
ment was seeking new legislation to com¬ 
bat the problem. 

Home Secretary Lloyd-George takes a 
somewhat fatalistic attitude toward the 
problem and doesn’t hold out much hope 
for any great change in the immediate 
future. He points out that the metro¬ 
politan police force is woefully under¬ 
manned to enforce the proposed new 
legislation anyway. His attitude seems to 
be that the whole vice problem is a vicious 
circle that is propelled along by some¬ 
thing like perpetual motion. 

"Unless you remove the demand,” he 
says with a touch of helpless resignation, 
"and I should be extremely interested to 
hear how that is to be done, prostitution 
will go on.” 


The hard-working girls who daily patrol 
■ the streets of seething, sinful Piccadilly 
Circus, could tell the Home Secretary 
that the supply has never yet caught up 
with the demand. But they are doing 
their best to help the process along and 
meanwhile, staid old London is steadily 
adding to its new reputation as the 
wicked city of the West. ■ ■ 


ADVENTURE 











THE CASE OF THE RED-HEADED CORPSE 

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 41 


S// 


"Holy Mother!” the patrolman said 
softly. "It’s a body!” He was a young 
cop and this was his first experience of 
the kind. 

The baggage chief was older and he 
took it calmly. "It’s a woman. Look at 
that hair!" 

The porter’s eyes were on the hair, 
too. It was astonishing to see that mass 
of clean and glittering silky red hair 
surrounded by the hacked up torso." Most 
astonishing was the color—a vibrant red. 

In a matter of minutes the baggage 
room was filled with terminal officials. 
The young cop had phoned his precinct 
station and a patrol car and morgue 
wagon arrived shortly. 


The porter didn’t bother with the rest 
■ of the lockers that night. He was too 
busy helping to hold back the crowd that 
kept gathering outside the baggage room 
after detectives arrived from Homicide, 
accompanied by Brooklyn District At¬ 
torney Miles C. McDonald and Assistant 
District Attorney Louis Andreozzi. 
Deputy Chief Inspector Patrick Kenny 
was in charge of the detectives. They left 
the body where it was until Police Com¬ 
missioner Thomas Francis Murphy ar- 

It was several hours later when the 
body was removed from the suitcase, at 
the Homicide morgue. By then the porter 
had gone home and the baggage room was 
closed for the night. 

The Homicide man said, "It’s not all 
here. Only the torso and head are here. 
There must be another bag somewhere.’’ 

So back to the terminal they went, a 
patrol car full of detectives. They called 
the baggage chief and waited for him to 
show up with the keys. 

"The porter stopped when he found 
the suitcase in number two-sixteen,” the 
chief baggage man said. "That means 
we should check from there on. It was a 
big suitcase and filled the locker. That 
means if the killer had another bag he 
would have put it into the next empty 
locker he could find.”' 

They found another smelly bag in num¬ 
ber two-twenty. It was a battered Glad¬ 
stone, and it contained the pelvis and the 
legs of the woman. 

A detective said, "There’re no hands. 
The killer cut the hands off. And they’re 
not in either bag.” 

The Homicide man said, "The other 
missing item is her teeth. She must have 
worn false teeth; she didn’t have a tooth 
in her head but the gums showed signs 
she’d worn plates. But they’re missing.” 

Somebody else said, "Hands can be 
identified by fingerprints and false teeth 
by a dentist." 

"Fingerprints wouldn’t mean anything 
unless she had a police record,” the 
Homicide man said. 

There was nothing in the bags to give 
a clue to the dead woman’s identity, but 
newspapers dated- November 18th and 
25 th gave a clue as to the time of the 


murder. They were Brooklyn papers which 
indicated the crime was committed in 
Brooklyn. So, the search for the killer 
began in the vicinity of the terminal. 

The several blocks surrounding the 
terminal contained many boarding houses 
or rooming houses. The suitcases had been 
cheap and battered, suggestive of the type 
person who might live in a cheap furn¬ 
ished room. The first move of the Brook¬ 
lyn police department was to assign a 
group of men to an intensive, door-to- 
door search of those rooming houses, 
searching for a fed-heade’d woman. 

The coroner. Dr. Marten, made his re¬ 
port on December 7th. The murdered 
woman had been between twenty-five and 
forty years old. She had given birth to a 
child or children. She had an appendec¬ 
tomy scar which was about ten years 
old. She had also suffered from a very 
serious heart ailment called adhesive peri¬ 
carditis. Her height was five feet seven 
inches and her weight about one hundred 
pounds. She had bad feet—feet which 
showed the work of chiropodist. The cor¬ 
oner added that she had been strangled, 
and that her body had been cut up with a 
sharp instrument and a saw. 

The details of the coroner’s report was 
given to the New York newspaper which 
were giving much space to the story. The 
wire services had sent the details out to 
newspapers around the country. 

A canvas of dentists and doctors was 
made, in the Brooklyn area, and many of 
them visited the morgue to see if the 
woman had been a patient. But no one 
had ever seen the dead woman before. 
That meant, for police records, that she 
had had the operation for appendicitis 
and had her teeth removed somewhere 
else. Perhaps she had only recently come 
to Brooklyn; they had no way of knowing. 

■ The police even visited chiropodists and 
hairdressers in the vicinity of the terminal. 
But none of them remembered the red¬ 
headed woman. 

A close check was made on dry-cleaning 
establishments in the ar'ea, to see of any 
clothing had been left in the past few 
days that had blood stains on them. 




t 


Modern speed hypnotism taught. Meth¬ 
ods revealed. You are shown exactly what to 
say and do. Photo illustrated. Many interesting 
experiments. Self-hypnosis is fully explained. A 
professional hypnotist tells you his secrets. 


free catalog of new hypnotism books son!on request. 



WILSHIRE SCHOOL OF HYPNOTISM 

8721 SUNSET BLVD. . DEPT. 19 
HOLLYWOOD 46, CALIFORNIA 


MAGIC IS fUNI MAKE MAGIC YOUR HOOEY I 


SKi.!a *.? < 

ja ags-s sag 1 "'* • 

LARGE!_JcATJ^LOO^OF^BOO^ AmjSw 


INVENTORS 

containing information on patent protection and pro¬ 
cedure with "Record of Invention” form will be 
forwarded to you upon request—without obligation. 

CLARENCE A. O'BRIEN A HARVEY JACOBSON 

Registered Patent Attorneys 
726-F District National Buildina 
Washington 3, D. C. 


40 ACRE GOVERNMENT 
OIL LEASES—$100 

cing-tiz* profit without ovor leaving home. Writs 
or free map and literature. 

Imericon Oil Scouts, Dipt. AM, 7321 Beverly Blvd 
Los Angeles 36, Calif. 


I Many Finish in 2 Years 


B ut the first break came not in Brook¬ 
lyn but from a little town upstate— 
from Saugerties, New York—just forty 
miles from New York City. A Mrs. Violet 
Martin went to the State Police head¬ 
quarters on Christmas Eve, carrying with 
her a copy of the local newspaper which 
contained an account of the police findings 
to date on the red-headed nude case. 

Mrs. Martin, an elderly woman, was the 
second wife of the sixty-year-old post¬ 
master of Saugerties. 

Mrs. Martin showed the police the news¬ 
paper. ”1 don’t want to worry Mr. Mar¬ 
tin,” she said anxiously. "But I thought 
I ought to ask you to check this story. 
You see, Mr. Martin had a daughter by 
his first wife. Dorothy is her name. She’s 
a good girl, but restless and she moves 
around a lot. But no matter, where 


If you did not or cannot finish high school, here is 
your opportunity. Study in spare time at home. Go 
as rapidly as your time and abilities permit. Course 
equivalent to residential school—prepares for college 
exams. Standard texts supplied. Credit for subjects 
already completed. Single subjects if desired. Diploma' 
awarded. Be a High School graduate. Start studies 
now. Free Bulletin. Write today. 

AMERICAN SCHOOL, Dept. H539 

Drexel at 58th, Chicago 37, Illinois 



MAY, 1957 


77 



























The man who 
wouldn’t give up 


500 MASSED 
ROCKETS shook 
Brooklyn Bridge, 
screamed up into 
the May evening 
and showered the 
city with red and 
gold. 

While behind a 
darkened window, 
a big, gaunt man sat and watched, too 
crippled and painwracked to attend the 
opening day festivities for the bridge. 

This was a pity, for he had built it. 

Which means that when money gave 
out, Chief Engineer Roebling pleaded for 
more. When disturbing changes of plan 
had to be made, Roebling fought them 
through. And when a hundred panicked 
men were trapped under the East River 
in a flooded caisson, Roebling saved them. 

Spinning the giant steel spiderweb not 
onlyrexacted 13 years of Roebling’s life, 
from 1870 to 1883, but very early in the 
game it crippled him forever with the cais¬ 
son disease. 

Yet he saw the job through to the end. 
His were the courage, skill and vision that 
make Americans a nation of great builders 
—a strong, growing nation. And a nation 
whose Savings Bonds rank with the 
world’s finest investments. 

For the constructive strength of 168 
million Americans stands behind these 
Bonds. This is why our Government can 
absolutely guarantee the safety of your 
principal—up to any amount—and the rate 
of interest you receive. 

You cannot get a fetter guarantee than 
that. Why not invest in U.S. Savings Bonds 
regularly—where you bank or through the 
Payroll Savings Plan where you work? 
And hold the Savings Bonds you have. 



Safe as America—VS. Savings Bonds 


The V .S'Goven 

this publication in cooperation with the 
Advertising Council and the Magazine 
Publishers of America . 


Dorothy is, at Christmas time she always 
sends me and her father a gift, or at 
least a card. I’ve been thinking about 
Dorothy all this week because there’s 
been no word of any kind from her—no 
Christmas card or gift, and this is unusual. 

"I know her father is worried because 
of it, although he hasn’t said anything. 
You see, Dorothy has a heart ailment—a 
real serious one. It’s called adhesive peri¬ 
carditis, which means the fluid in between 
the two layers of tissue covering the heart 
is dried up, and the heart can’t pump so 
well. Any sort of strain could kill Dorothy 
at any time.” 

The woman paused for breath and the 
State Police chief said gently, "You want 
us to send out a missing persons report 
on her, Mrs. Martin?” 

T he woman shook her head, held out 
the newspaper and pointed to the front 
page story. 

"No, sir,” she said. "But I thought I 
ought to ask you to check this story. 
You see, the description of the red¬ 
headed' woman they found in those suit¬ 
cases in the Brooklyn terminal—” she 
paused, shuddered and her face whitened. 
"You see, the description fits Dorothy. 
The appendicitis operation scar, the lack 
of teeth—Dorothy lost her teeth when she 
was very young, due to illness. She's got 
fallen arches and very delicate feet and 
she has to go to foot doctors all the time. 
The hair—well, Dorothy’s hair is naturally 
red and the most beautiful stuff you have 

The State Police chief checked what 
she said against the printed description 
of the mysterious nude corpse, and he 
asked questions. Dorothy had left home 
after her brother, Henry, had got into 
trouble; he and an ex-convict he had met 
in a bar had rolled a drunk in a New 
York hotel while they were on a drinking 
spree. The drunk had been strangled and 
died. Henry and the ex-convict had been 
caught and sent to prison for their crime. 

Dorothy was embarrassed to go on 
living in the small town where everybody 
knew her as the sister of a murderer so 
she had gone to Baltimore and got a job 
in a hospital there. She had married a 
Baltimore man and had two children by 
him. Both of the babies, however, had 
died at birth and finally the marriage 
ended in divorce and Dorothy had moved 
to New York. She had a job at the 
Brooklyn State Hospital, and there she 
had met a man named Pasquale Donofrio, 
who was a house painter by trade and 
did odd jobs for the hospital. 

"Dorothy wrote us that she had mar¬ 
ried Pasquale Donofrio and that they 
were living in a rooming house in Fort 
Greene Place, in Brooklyn. This was in the 
letter she sent us on Thanksgiving. She 
wrote me letters in which she told me 
things that she didn’t put in the letters 
to her father, and she’d ask me not to 
tell him some of the things because she 
didn’t want to worry him.” 

“What sort of ’ things did she write 
you that she didn’t tell her father?” the 
state cop asked gently. 

"Well, one time she wrote that Pasquale 

78 


had terrible fits of temper, and in one of 
them he hit her once and broke her jaw.” 

There hadn’t been anything in the 
coroner’s report that mentioned a broken 
jaw, but the state cop made a note of it. 

The State Police officer made his report 
to the Brooklyn Homicide chief. As a 
matter of routine an x-ray was ordered 
to determine if the jaw bone of the red- 
haired corpse showed a break. 

The Brooklyn police also checked the 
name Donofrio against their police rec¬ 
ords; both Dorothy Martin and- Pasquale 
had records. 

The Fort Greene Place address, which 
the State Police chief had passed along to 
them from the letters Mrs. Martin showed 
from Dorothy, had been checked in 1 the 
routine search of rooming houses on 
December 4th; at that time the super¬ 
intendent of the building assured them 
that none of his tenants was missing. 

Assistant District Attorney Andreozzi 
and a New York detective went up to 
Saugerties to double-check on the report 
from Mrs. Martin as soon as the coroner 
gave them the report on the x-rays, which 
showed a break in the jawbone of the 
corpse just where Mrs. Martin had de¬ 
scribed the break in her stepdaughter’s 

Meanwhile, the superintendent of the 
Fort Greene Place rooming house was 
questioned again. When asked about Mr. 
and Mrs. Pasquale Donofrio the super¬ 
intendent readily admitted they occupied 
a room on the third floor of his house. 

After the first visit from the police he 
had asked Mr. Donofrio about his wife 
when he didn’t see her around for a day 
or two. 

"Donofrio said she’d gone home to 
Albany to visit her folks for Christmas,” 
the nervous superintendent said. "Honest, 
when you asked me before if any of my 
tenants were missing I hadn’t missed Mrs. 
Donofrio. It wasn’t until several days 
later that I realized I hadn’t seen her 
around for a few days.” 

"Why didn’t you come and tell us when 
you missed her?” the Brooklyn detective 
asked sharply. 

"I—I, well, at the time I had this con¬ 
versation with Mr. Donofrio he payed me 
the week’s rent and said he was giving 
up the room to go up to Albany and join 
his wife for Christmas with her folks. 
He said they were thinking of staying up 
there. He was a house painter and he 
thought he could make as good a living 
up there as he did in Brooklyn. His wife 
wasn’t well, and he wanted her to give 
up her job at the hospital . . .” 


T he day after Pasquale Donofrio had 
paid his rent and moved out of the 
room, the superintendent had rented it to 
another couple. When police demanded to 
see the room the superintendent took 
them up to it and the nervous young 
couple stood by as they examined every 
inch of the place. 

They found stains on the rug and on 
the floor that hard scrubbing by both the 
young woman tenant and the superin¬ 
tendent had not been able to remove. One 
of the most noticeable features of the 


ADVENTURE 





dingy room was the fact that two of the 
walls were painted cream color and the 
other two had a fresh coat of green paint. 
It was apparent that the cream colored 
paint job was considerably older than the 
two green walls. 

"Mr. Donofrio painted the walls,” the 
superintendent said. "I didn't know he’d 
painted them until the day he was leaving. 
I helped him carry out his stuff, and when 
I asked about the walls he said he’d had 
some green paint left over from a job 
and he thought it would brighten up the 

rnnm o hit ” 


Qetectives scraped off spots of the green 

. paint at various points and when the 
paint was analysed it showed human 
blood. The spots on the floor and on the 
rug and on a bureau were tested and they, 
too, showed human blood. 

Brooklyn police began an all-out search 
for Pasquale Donofrio. His police record 
gave a Brooklyn address on Union Street. 
A check at that place revealed that he 
had not been seen in that neighborhood 
since the arrest. A check with the house 
painters union gave no record of Pasquale 
Donofrio; he was a lone-wolf painter who 
worked outside the unipn. Police located 
Donofrio’s elderly parents in Brooklyn, but 
they had not seen or heard from their son 
in years. 

Now that police knew the identity of 
the murder suspect they sought, the search 
was easier. Knowing what type of man 
Donofrio was they knew what sections to 
search. And they knew, from his record, 
that he was not a wanderer type so they 
concentrated on a thorough search of the 
complicated vastness of Brooklyn. 

One day, just a little over a month 
after the body of Dorothy Martin was 
found in the terminal locker, Brooklyn 
detectives found Pasquale Donofrio in a 
room on Dean Street, just a few blocks 
from Brooklyn police headquarters. Al¬ 
though the tenant in the first floor front 
room was known to his landlord as 
Dominick Parsi, the detective who ques¬ 
tioned the owner of the rooming house 
knew he had found his man when he got 
the description df the tenant in the front 
room. The cop called for help, not leaving 
the house for fear 'the landlord might 
tip off his tenant. 

When a squad of men arrived from 
headquarters they went up to the room 
occupied by the man who called himself 
Parsi. 

The sound of heavy footsteps on the 
street stairs had reached the tenant in the 
first floor front room. As the detectives 
left the landlord’s apartment in the base¬ 
ment and started toward the front of the 
house, a dark, bald little man darted out 
of the front room and ran up the stairs. 
The first detective, coming up the stairs 
from the cellar apartment, spotted the run¬ 
ning figure. Instinctively, the cop ran after 
him, and was followed by the rest of the 
squad. 

They caught Donofrio as he tried to 
climb the ladder leading from the third 
floor to the roof of the house. They took. 
him to headquarters although he protested 
that his name was Dominick Parsi and 


that he was hiding from his wife and 
that he had thought she had the police 
looking for him. But the police weren't 
fooled. A quick check on his fingerprints 
proved he was Donofrio. 

The questioning of Donofrio continued 
until, finally, the exhausted . man broke 
down and confessed to the murder of 
Dorothy Martin. 

And when the confession came it was 
the most casual account of cold-blooded 
mayhem the hardened corps of lawmen 
had ever heard. 

"We were sitting in the room drinking,” 
Donofrio began the confession. "We got 
into an argument. I don’t know what it 
was about. I forget. But t get mad quick. 
We got into fights like that before—she’d 
say something that riled me, and I’d let 
her have it. This time I choked her. I 
didn’t choke hard, I think. But suddenly 
she went limp. I figure she’d fainted. She 
had a weak heart. So I got a towel, wet 
it and put it over her face. I figured 
tljat’d bring her out of it. I was tired, so 
I lay down on the bed and went to sleep. 
She was laying on the floor, where she 
fell. I figured she’d get up and come to 
bed when she snapped out of it.” 

When Donofrio awakened the next 
morning Dorothy was still lying on the 
floor, with the wet towel over her face 
just as it had been when he went to 
sleep. She hadn’t moved an inch. He 
knew before he felt her cold body that 
she was dead. 

He looked out the window and saw 
that it was snowing and cold. A wind 
drove the thick snow against the window 
so hard it sounded like sleet hitting the 
glass, and the street outside was piled 
high with snow drifts and empty of peo¬ 
ple. The day was Saturday, November 
25th; he wouldn’t be expected to work 
that day and he knew that most of the 
people in the house would not be working 
either and would sleep late. That meant 
there wouldn’t be much traffic in and out 
of the house. He planned his moves. 

"I had a sharp tool that I use to 
scrape paint off doors,” he said, "and a 
saw that I used in odd-job carpentry 
work I do. I got out the two suitcases 
Dorothy kept under the bed. I measured 
her so I’d know just where to .cut to make 
her fit into the bags. Apd 1 believe me, it 
ain’t easy to cut up a body. It’s real 'hard 
work. I got hungry, finally, from all the 
work it took. So I left the job half finished 
and went out to eat. 

”1 brought in some more newspapers,” 
he continued, "because there was only one 
paper in the room." That was the paper 
dated November 18th. The paper he 
bought while he was out eating was the 
one dated November 25th that police had 
found in the bags. 


Ue put the body in the two suitcases 
except the hands and the teeth. 

"I know the cops could find out who 
she was by checking her fingerprints. And 
I know they identify people from their 
dental work. So I wrapped the hands in a 
piece of paper and put them in a paper 
bag and I put her plates in my pocket. I 
left the house with the two suitcases with 

79 



Is 1 

JOB-TENSION 


Hidden Cause of 
These Diseases? 


Authorities often trace torturing gas¬ 
trointestinal ailments including co¬ 
litis, constipation, even hemorrhoids to 
the nerve-racking “high-tension” pace 
at which we live. They say, too, that 
these ailments make tension worse— 
trapping their victims in a vicious 
circle. Write today and learn how a 
world-famous clinic, with complete re¬ 
sources, helps patients break this “vi¬ 
cious cycle”—using methods refined by 
56 years and over 82,000 cases. Address 
McCleary Clinic and Hospital 
549 Elms Blvd. 

Excelsior Springs 6, Mo. 



LAW... 


STUDY AT HOME 

and public life. Greater opportunities now than ever before. 

Mote Ability: Mere Prestige: More Money^,; Jr^-VoS 


FREE BOOK 



MAY, 1957 





















Dorothy inside and I didn't meet anybody 
either inside the house or on the street 
all the way to the terminal.” 

There were other people putting bags 
into the lockers in the terminal so Dono- 
frio didn’t attract any attention there. He 
had no fear of being caught now. He knew 
the bags would be taken from the lockers 
in twenty-four hours and left in the bag¬ 
gage room until called for. 

"I’d payed a week’s rent in advance at 
the Fort Greene Place room and I figured 
the superintendent there would be more 
suspicious if I moved out right away than 
he would if I waited until the rent was 
due again. It would be Christmas then and 
it would be logical that Dorothy and me 
would go upstate to spend the holidays 
with her folks. The super knew about 
them because he saw Dorothy's letters 
from her mother and father, with the 
return address on them. And Dorothy 
had talked with him about her hometown. 

"I knew when the cops came to question 
the superintendent about the tenants in 
the house. I stayed home that week, telling 
the super I had a cold. So he didn’t come 
to the room, but when he heard me mov¬ 
ing around inside he couldn’t know if it 
was me or Dorothy.” 

Unfortunately, the police who checked 
the Fort Greene Place rooming house had 
not, at that point, asked if there was a 
red-haired woman tenant. 

When the end of that week rolled 
around Donofrio told the superintendent 
that he and his wife were going to 
Albany for the holidays and that they 
planned to live up there with her parents. 
There was nothing suspicious about the 
move, so there was nothing for the 
superintendent to report to the police. 


MANHUNT CONTINUED FROM 

through suddenly crystallized fear of a 
full reprisal party. The drunkard and the 
Blackfoot would run like the wind, that 
Iron Legs knew, but their leader, Fire 
Hair, was no coward. Fear alone would 
not smother the freckled trapper’s cau¬ 
tion. There must be a better reason for 
such wanton carelessness. 

The Cree threw himself over his tired 
pony and pushed onward. He nursed the 
animal and took an early cover in a 
windfall. Making no attempt to conceal 
his fire he stretched out and stared 
bleakly at the flames. . . . 


pire Hair and his companions had come 
“ to the Cree encampment just before 
the snows last whistled down from the 
north. They brought whiskey and kettles 
and beads as peace offerings and the Crees 
were so captivated by the fiery ringlets 
and beard of the leader that they tolerated 
the Blackfoot guide, a hated enemy from 
beyond the Shining Mountains. 

The visitors had been well-behaved 
while they did their winter trapping, and 
it was not until the spring thaws began to 
breathe holes in the deep snow that they 
showed any disregard for propriety. The 
Blackfoot opened no breaches; he was 


Donofrio moved out of that room and 
went, not to Albany, but to the Dean 
Street address. 

"The hands?” he repeated when asked 
about them and the missing teeth. "I 
walked across the Brooklyn Bridge, look¬ 
ing for a chance to throw them in the 
river. But I had bad luck. The subways 
had been unable to run that day because 
of the heavy snow. No taxis or cars could 
move through the streets either. Lots of 
people who lived in Brooklyn and worked 
in Manhattan had to walk home that day 
and the bridges were full of pedestrians. I 
never got a chance to throw the hands 
over the rail into the river.” 

He walked on over into Manhattan and 
finally he came upon a stalled Department 
of Sanitation garbage truck half-filled with 
garbage. He tossed the paper bag con¬ 
taining Dorothy’s hands into the truck. 

"I shoved the teeth deep down in a 
garbage can I found sitting inside a 
hallway,” Donofrio continued. "I knew it 
would be emptied onto a garbage truck 
and taken to the dump and burned. So 
would the hands. The way I figured, they 
couldn’t ever identify the body now even 
when they found it in the bags.” 

But Donofrio was wrong, as so many 
murderers have been, in figuring they can 
commit the perfect crime. No two bodies 
are ever alike, no matter how much a 
person may resemble hundreds of other 
people. 

Pasquale Donofrio was convicted of 
first-degree manslaughter and sentenced to 
serve ten to twenty years in Sing Sing for 
the crime of murdering Dorothy Martin. 
Only the fact that it was not a pre¬ 
meditated case of murder saved him from 
the electric chair. ■ ■ 


PAGE 49 


too aware of his precarious position. The 
thin man with the burning eyes was the 
first transgressor. In the beginning Fire 
Hair restrained his friend when he reeled 
drunkenly through the camp, but when 
the freckled giant’s eyes settled on the 
Chipewyan woman he forgot all else. 

The thin man carried a black book in 
one hand and he shouted as he waved the 
book aloft. The council sachem said the 
book had magical properties—a robed 
white man had spoken of it in the Assini- 
boine country—and the chiefs forbade any 
Cree to touch the visitors. 

Iron Legs stirred restlessly. He had ob¬ 
served the council order and had done 
nothing when his woman ran panting into 
their lodge with her dress torn at one 
shoulder, and he turned a deaf ear to 
Soaring Eagle’s sarcasm. Even before the 
incident. Soaring Eagle had openly de¬ 
rided the Chipewyan woman whom he 
had traded to Iron Legs for two buffalo 
robes. 

She and her brother had been cast out 
of their tribe with a father who showed 
signs of smallpox. They wandered from 
the inland sea to the Slave River and 
were keening beside the dead father's body 
when Soaring Eagle’s raiding party found 
them, gaunt and frozen. The brother was 


80 


ADVENTURE 




















slain immediately and Soaring Eagle 
made the woman disrobe completely in 
the snow. When he saw no smallpox 
blemish on her he took her back to camp, 
her brother’s scalp dangling over her head 
on her captor’s lance. 

Iron Legs threw a stick on the fire and 
listened as it sputtered. The woman had 
looked like a weasel long hung in a snare 
when he first saw her. Only her great 
black eyes showed spirit. They snapped 
when Soaring Eagle kicked her as she 
staggered beside his pony, and she spat at 
the war chief, refusing to raise her arms 
in protection when he brought his quirt 
down on her head. 

Even so. Iron Legs would not have 
sought the woman from sympathy. He 
knew what he was and he knew how the 
Cree maidens mocked his rolling walk be¬ 
hind his back. His abnormally short legs 
and dangling arms set him apart as a 
freak. Life had been an agony in adoles¬ 
cence, with Soaring Eagle on clean, 
straight limbs leading the ridicule. Iron 
Legs’ uncle, Man Who Walks With Deer, 
took compassion on the tormented boy 
and offered wisdom. 

"Not all men are war chiefs. I am a 
hunter. The war chiefs would starve 
beside empty kettles without my meat.” 


S o the misshapen youth rode with his 
uncle and learned to'track and kill the 
elk and the shaggy buffalo. The gibes 
came less frequently, and when they did 
the boy acted as his uncle counselled. He 
would take a strip of dried meat from a 
small pouch at his waist and throw it 
wordlessly at the feet of his tormentors. 
When he fasted alone in the hills at man¬ 
hood he had no symbolic dream like the 
other young Crees, but he lied and blandly 
reported a vision of standing in a cauldron 
of fire without feeling pain; and he took 
the name Iron Legs. 

With manhood came a nameless stir¬ 
ring that reawakened the pangs of being 
different. Man Who Walks With Deer 
gave his last counsel to the young hunter. 

"A man can buy a woman for ponies 
or a rifle,” he said. 

Iron Legs had balked. Not that he re¬ 
sented the dowry which was customary 
among his people, but in his case there 
would be no true courtship. He would 
only be buying an unwilling woman and 
his pride rebelled. 

It was Soaring Eagle’s contempt that 
made Iron Legs buy the skinny Chipe¬ 
wyan. When the war chief struck her 
with the quirt she fell against ‘the hunter 
in the crowd that gathered, and threw 
her arms around him to keep from falling. 

"The woman favors Iron Legs,” Soaring 
Eagle remarked with heavy sarcasm. "For 
two buffalo robes he need no longer gather 
wood for his lonely campfire.” 

Iron Legs eyed the haughty chief and 
listened to the snickers in the crowd. He 
had never hated the arrogant warrior so 
intensely as he did at that moment. Dis¬ 
entangling himself from the woman’s 
arms he walked stiffly to his lodge and 
returned with two robes which he tossed 
to the ground before his tormentor’s pony. 
Then he supported the fainting woman to 

MAY, 1957 


his lodge, his spine rigid as open laughter 
broke out behind him. 

Iron Legs had never demanded anything 
from the Chipewyan, not even when his 
meat put softly curving flesh on her bones 
and restored the luster to her shining 
black hair. Even now, as he lay by his 
trail fire, the Cree marvelled at the miracle 
that changed a shivering wretch into a 
beautiful maiden. She had walked with a 
proud dignity and lowered her eyes mod¬ 
estly on the infrequent occasions when 
Iron Legs spoke to her. He saw the 
baffled rage inflame Soaring Eagle as the 
transformation took place and it was re¬ 
ward enough. Iron Legs still knew what 
he was in a woman’s eyes—even to a cap¬ 
tive woman—and he maintained an in¬ 
visible wall in the privacy of their lodge. 

Nevertheless, he had been stunned when 
he returned from his two day hunt and 
found the woman gone with the trappers. 
Soaring Eagle advised the council he was 
opposed to a pursuit party. 

"The woman is not a Cree,” said 
Soaring Eagle. "She is a low Chipewyan 
and she went willingly with Fire Hair.” 
His eyes flickered spitefully over Iron 
Legs’ stunted limbs. 

"I will hunt them alone,” said Iron 
Legs gravely. He rose to his feet and 
stared stonily at Soaring Eagle. "I will re¬ 
turn with the woman and three scalps. 
If she left my lodge willingly I will bring 
back four scalps.” 

Soaring Eagle flushed at the admiring 
murmur of approval which rolled through 
the council. "You say,” he sniffed. 

"I say.” Iron Legs stood as tall as he 
could. "Have I ever sought help in track¬ 
ing down the grizzly bear? Let the war 
chief sit by his fire and fashion plumes 
for his lances while Iron Legs hunts 
alone.” 

The fire was low and Iron Legs felt 
knives of cold nipping his bones. He 
rolled in his blanket and stared up at 
Moon Woman's garden of stars in the 
black sky. 

Did the Chipewyan go of her own ac¬ 
cord with the trappers? There had been 
moments when she brushed against him 
and Iron Legs had felt warmth in her 
midnight eyes. He noticed that she had 
ceased to look at his legs. 

The hunter tugged savagely at a loose 
blanket and his lips curled back from his 
teeth. "Four scalps,” he muttered. 


TFhe prairie country opened before the 
* Cree like a wasteland. Green shoots 
soon would be scrubby heralds of grass 
that would draw the hungry buffalo, but 
now Iron Legs and his pony moved 
through the flat reaches like ants in a 
honeyed bowl. 

The third day on the open prairie he 
lay in an old buffalo wallow with his 
rifle aimed at the belly of the thin man. 
The trapper tramped across the winter- 
dead land holding crossed sticks before 
his face and singing loudly. When Iron 
Legs rose from the ground before him he 
never faltered. The Cree’s fingers relaxed 
on the trigger when he saw the thin man’s 
eyes. 

Iron Legs had witnessed that empty 

81 


Shrinks Hemmorhoids 
New Way Without Surgery 

Science Finds Healing Substance That 
Relieves Pain — Shrinks Hemorrhoids 

For the first time science has found a new 
healing substance with the astonishing ability 
to shrink hemorrhoids and to relieve paln- 
without surgery. 

In case after case, while gently relieving pain, 
actual reduction (shrinkage) took place. 

Most amazing of all-results were so thorough 
that sufferers made astonishing statement like 
“Piles have ceased to be a problem!” 

The secret is a new healing substance (Bio- 
Dyne*)-discovery of a world-famous research 
institute. 

This substance is now available in suppository 
or ointment form under the name Preparation 
H.o Ask for it at all drug counters-money back 
guarantee. _ *Reg. U. S. Pat. Off. 

DIVORCE 

and Separate Maintenance laws 

plained—your rights and duties—what you should 
know—easy to read—pocket-size booklet. 

PRICE $1.00 


MARK-DELLA Bo l 3 tXT*'' a ' 



co ° ■mmaaaamaa 


CRYDER SALES CR-30 

Whitestone 57 N. Y. 
























stare before and he could not take the 
hair of a madman. Not even Soaring 
Eagle would attempt so heinous a crime. 
He jabbed the rifle muzzle against the 
thin man’s ribs as he passed and the 
trapper brandished his sticks. 

"Repent!” he screamed. "Repent your 
sins, ye Soddomites and be spared the 
wrath of the Lord!” 

Iron Legs made his way over the rise 
where he had hidden his pony and 
watched silently as the madman marched 
off, singing, to nowhere. Kicking his pony 
he followed the trail eastward. 


An hour later he heard muffled thunder 
from the cloudless horizon and real¬ 
ized, with the sickening futility of delayed 
intelligence, why Fire Hair's party was 
racing to the east. They were trying to 
ford the Athabasca River before the spring 
thaws cracked the ice, a close bit of timing 
that would leave a pursuit party stranded 
helplessly behind. Iron Legs flailed his 
heels against the pony’s flanks, numb 
with rage as the thunder banged tre¬ 
mendous echoes across the skies. 

The breakup had begun. Great, green¬ 
ish-white slabs of ice rose like glistening 
peaks which ground together and toppled 
with mighty splashes in widening circles 
of open water. The heaving mass made a 
hellish cannonade which drowned out 
Iron Legs’ dumb wail of despair. In his 
fury he tried to urge the frightened pony 
out on the shifting pack and pounded his 
fist on the animal's neck when it balked. 

When reason returned he pointed the 
pony’s head south and scoured the river 
bank with his eyes. If Fire Hair had 
missed his timing he would turn south. 
West would bring him into the arms of 
the pursuit party he felt was inevitable 
and north lay the land of the Chipewyan’s 
people. A sick Chipewyan might be ostra¬ 
cized by her tribe, but it would be risky to 
take a healthy captive among her people 
... if she was a prisoner. Iron Legs 
gnawed his lower lip at the thought. 

When he found the party’s trail he 
scrambled to the ground. There were many 
tracks milling about and he felt a thrill of 
exultation when he saw the trail lead 
south. He came across the same sign a 
number of times. Obviously Fire Hair 
had reconnoitered the breaking ice at sev¬ 
eral points, moving on when he found the 
footing too dangerous. Late in the after¬ 
noon the Cree came upon a space of torn 
turf and saw blood on a rock. The trail 
continued south for the main party while 
one pony, with more bloodied rocks be¬ 
side the unshod tracks, forked westward. 
Iron Legs left the river. A wounded man 
-or woman—would not take much time 
to run down. 

He found the Blackfoot at dusk, sitting 
with his back to a lightning-blasted tree. 
The Blackfoot tried to raise his gun from 
his knees and then dropped it, coughing 
up blood. He raised his eyes as Iron Legs 
dismounted and walked toward him with 
a cocked rifle. Iron Legs kicked the man’s 
gun beyond reach and looked down into 
the dying eyes. 

"Did the woman go willingly?” he 
asked. When the Blackfoot grinned he 

82 


brought the rifle butt down savagely on 
one knee. The wounded man gritted his 
teeth and took a deep breath. 

"I am Blackfoot," he croaked proudly. 
"I fear no Cree.” * 

Another fit of coughing wracked him 
. and a steady scarlet stream flowed from 
his nose and mouth. In halting whispers 
he told Iron Legs of his fight with Fire 
Hair when the trapper refused to turn 
west to the Shining Mountains after the 
breaking ice blocked their eastward flight. 
They fought with knives and when the 
Blackfoot lay on the ground with Fire 
Hair’s blade in his bowels the trapper 
shot him in the chest. After a tremendous 
burst of coughing the Blackfoot spat 
blood at Iron Legs’ feet. 

"All Crees are dogs,” he said. 

He fell to one side and died with his 
face in the ground. Iron Legs wrapped 
the body in the Blackfoot’s blanket, 
pointing the head toward the Shining 
Mountains, and returned to the river. 

He rode all night, seeing no campfire 
and expecting none, Taking cover in a 
copse of river brush he gnawed at a strip 
of dried meat and listened to a marmot 
whistling nearby. A flight of pintails 
wheeled overhead in the lightening sky, 
winging back from their southern retreat 
like excited voyageurs on the last leg of 
a long journey home. A doe picked her 
way delicately to the river bank and 
gazed with luminous eyes at the floes 
scudding past. 

The deer was upwind and Iron Legs 
made no motion or sound. When the ani¬ 
mal suddenly disappeared through a 
spruce thicket in a series of tremendous 
leaps the Cree flattened his body and 
blinked down the barrel of his rifle. 


pire Hair walked downriver slowly, 
■ leading one pony. Iron Legs’ shot 
caught him in the stomach and he bent 
double. For a big man he moved remark¬ 
ably fast. He threw himself flat on his 
pony’s back and raced into sheltering 
timber with the second bullet whining 
inches above his rump. The Cree was only 
momentarily disgusted to find that his 
own pony had slipped its hobbles and 
wandered away. The half hour he spent 
finding the animal was of no great con¬ 
cern. Iron Legs had never met a man who 
could travel far with a bullet in his belly. 

His composure wavered as he followed 
his enemy’s trail. There was no blood 
sign, not so much as a drop. When he 
entered the small ravine where the Chipe¬ 
wyan had awaited Fire Hair with the 
pack ponies Iron Legs went over the 
ground desperately but found no blood. 
The Cree remembered the thin man’s 
black book and shuddered. This was pow¬ 
erful medicine that defied a steel slug. 

Fire Hair stopped running in heedless 
flight. He now masked trail signs, left 
false trails, doubled back. Iron Legs was 
tireless running down the blind alleys and 
back trails. 

For another eight days they ranged 
through lower Alberta. Lupines appeared 
and golden lillies stole across bare moun¬ 
tain meadows. Frozen streams shook their 
winter coats free and met at cataracts 


that hurled them into dark gorges. 

Iron Legs took trout from pools and ate 
them raw. His meat was gone and he 
would not risk a shot for game. He was 
exhausted, a hollow-eyed man forcing 
himself forward on stumpy legs, search¬ 
ing a final goal that burned inside his 
skull like prairie fire. 

A festering boil broke out under his 
left arm, another on his neck. He lanced 
them with his knife and chanced a bath 
in a bubbling sulphur pool, holding his 
rifle high as he bathed. Two days later 
the boils reappeared and it was agony 
when his arm rubbed against his side. 


lie found Fire Hair’s belt and discov- 
ered no powerful medicine had saved 
the trapper on the river bank. The huge 
silver buckle was bent almost in half by 
the impact of the rifle slug. The belt hung 
from a bush and Iron Legs puzzled over 
the ostentatious show of trail sign. 

The following day he came upon a 
lamed pack pony.grazing in a canyon. 
Fire Hair’s winter catch of skins was still 
roped to the animal’s back and Iron Legs 
felt a feverish excitement as he removed 
the skins. He was not surprised when he 
heard a shot later in the day and found a 
deer with one hind quarter missing. He 
cut steaks from the same carcass and 
roasted the meat as he watched Fire 
Hair’s smoke spiral up across a narrow 
valley. 

The chase was done. Iron Legs made 
medicine that night and rubbed his rifle 
with fat from the deer carcass, remem¬ 
bering the many times the faithless Chipe¬ 
wyan woman had performed the same 
chore in their lodge. 

He ate again at dawn and daubed his 
face and chest with Vermillion he carried 
in a steel match box. When he saw smoke 
he mounted his pony and slowly made his 
way to the valley floor. 

Fire Hair made his stand on a bluff. 
Iron Legs saw sunlight glinting off metal 
on a granite shelf and he dismounted 
while still beyond rifle range. Timber was 
thin below the bluff and the Cree was 
certain the trapper had a stream within 
reach. Fire Hair had picked a site that 
couldn’t be overwhelmed by numbers, and 
his deer haunch would hold him up a 
long time against a starvation siege. 

Iron Legs took his time on the ascent, 
saving his wind. He moved through the 
timber and stepped into sunlight thirty 
yards from Fire Hair’s stand. A bullet 
smacked into a spruce beside him and 
Iron Legs flopped to the ground and 
umped a return shot at the trapper 
neeling behind a boulder. Stone, chips 
flew and the Cree slid behind the spruce. 
He settled down to a sniping sortie and 
was surprised when he heard Fire Hair 
call him by name. 

"You come alone!” shouted the bearded 
man. "Is the woman that important to 
you, little maggot?” The Cree ignored the 
insult. 

"I’ll make a deal with you!” roared 
Fire Hair. He poked his head over the 
boulder, grinning, and Iron Legs fired 
again as the trapper ducked. "Did you 
see what I did to the Blackfoot? He was 


ADVENTURE 


a man! A Cree don’t have the guts to 
fight like a Blackfoot!” Fire Hair shouted 
an obscene description of Cree men. 

"I will fight you,” Iron Legs called. 
"Throw away your rifle.” When the trap¬ 
per didn’t answer he taunted him: "Are 
you afraid, old woman?” 

Fire Hair’s laughter boomed through 
the timber and an instant later he was 
standing erect with his rifle held over¬ 
head. When Iron Legs threw his own 
rifle aside the trapper followed suit, pull¬ 
ing a knife from a leg scabbard. 

He let Iron Legs make it to-the shelf 
before he rushed. The powerful trunk and 
short legs of the Cree were deceptive, and 
Iron Legs had no trouble bending under 
the arcing blade. His own knife slashed 
along the ribs of Fire Hair and one leg 
sent the big man sprawling. The trapper 
recovered with the same amazing speed 
he displayed on the river bank and turned 
to face the Cree, spitting dirt from his 
mouth. 

They fought for twenty minutes. Fire 
Hair trumpeted insults at first, but the 
elusive Indian with the child’s legs was 
quicksilver, sliding away from thrusts 
and groin-tearing knees like an otter. 
Sweat broke out on both men and they 
labored for breath. The trapper’s shirt 
was in rags and both sides of his body 
were criss-crossed with glistening stripes. 
The Cree’s lips were mashed from an el¬ 
bow butt, and a deep knife furrow over 
his right eye was blinding him with blood. 

It was when they stood locked together 
in a tiny stream that the trapper began to 
show fear. Each held the other’s knife 
wrist and they strained to bring their 


blades home by brute force. The Cree 
looked like a pygmy before the other 
man, but his knife relentlessly edged in 
toward Fire Hair’s body. The trapper 
trembled with effort but could not halt 
the blade’s progress. He gambled on a 
quick turn and the Cree’s knife slashed 
across his heaving chest. Iron Legs lunged 
off balance and his weapon flew through 
the air. 

The trapper bellowed triumphantly and 
grabbed the Cree by the hair, pulling him 
toward the knife arm which Iron Legs 
still held. It seemed so easy, like an over¬ 
grown boy dragging a poorly made doll, 
but the doll’s free arm was corded sinew 
that bulged as a groping hand found Fire 
Hair’s rope belt. The Cree’s back and 
comic legs strained and the trapper rose 
in the air, kicking and heaving. 

Iron Legs held him on his head an in¬ 
stant and then bent his knees slightly and 
heaved. He leaped as the trapper landed 
with one leg bent under his heavy body 
and the two of them sprawled in the 
stream. The tibia made a distinct crack¬ 
ing sound and Fire Hair screamed with 
pain. Iron Legs got to his feet and stared 
down at the moaning man through blood- 
filled eyes. He staggered back to the shelf 
and had turned with his knife when he 
saw the woman. 

She was sitting between the hobbled 
ponies with her knees drawn up, her 
wrists tied to her ankles. Iron Legs looked 
at the ropes and the livid bruise on the 
woman’s face and blinked his eyes. He 
bent to slash the ropes and helped her to 
her feet. 

"You did not run away?” 


"Does a man bind a willing woman?" 

He reached out and gently touched her 
swollen cheek. Then he spun on his heel 
and hefted the knife. The woman caught 
his arm. 

"His leg is broken. There is no honor 
in taking the hair of a helpless man.” 
When he growled she lifted her head. 
"It was done to my brother. I will die 
hating the coward who did it.” 

Iron Legs wavered. He had promised 
scalps and Soaring Eagle would mock 
him if he returned with empty hands. 
The old, maddening taunts would break 
out again. Iron Legs had followed a long, 
heartbreaking trail and had beaten his 
enemy honestly. He had endured much 
and was entitled to the respect he hun¬ 
gered for among his own people. 

He stared at the Chipewyan and she 
did not turn awayj and he knew this 
proud woman would live by her own 
peculiar code. If he took his sobbing 
enemy’s scalp she would remain always 
nothing more than a dumb captive.' Iron 
Legs looked at the rope marks on her 
wrists and walked to the stream. 

“I leave you one pony,” he said to Fire 
Hair. "Your rifle will be left down the 
trail. If your medicine is good you may 
reach Montana country alive.” He drew 
himself erect. "I am Iron Legs. Never 
cross my trail again.” 

As he rode down to the valley with the 
woman on a pony behind him Iron Legs 
touched the rough mud poultice she had 
fashioned for his arm boil and his chest 
swelled. It was good to have a faithful 
woman. No man should walk alone . . . 
at any price. ■ ■ 


DON’T BE AFRAID OF THAT OPERATION! CONTINUED FROM PAGE 47 


in your life, and thanks to your group 
insurance, you aren’t worried about the 
doctors’ bills. 

If you were Allan A., one morning last 
June you would wake up with what you 
might diagnose as a "a stitch” in your 
side. Your stomach would feel kind of 
funny, too, and you wouldn’t have your 
usual appetite for the waffles and syrup 
your wife, Polly, has made. You don’t let 
her know you’re not feeling so hot, and 
you go to work, trying to forget yourself 
in the rush of serving early morning 
commuters. 

But you can’t forget. Those steps be¬ 
tween cars seem longer and longer today, 
and you have ■ a constant feeling of 
nausea even though you haven’t eaten 
much all day. You report in sick at noon, 
and are told you have the choice of the 
company doctor or your own. You pick 
your own, and like all family doctors he 
tells you not to be alarmed, we’ll have 
you fixed up in no time. 

But the grin leaves his face, and the 
joviality departs from his voice as you 
lay on the table waiting for his examina¬ 
tion to end. You grunt and groan with 
the pressure of his fingers, and when 
you’re putting on your clothes, he suggests 
that it might be a good idea to arrange 
with your company to take some sick 
leave, say about two or three weeks. 

MAY, 1957 


You’re going to need it. You have an 
acute appendicitis. 

If you were Allan A., you would be 
panic-stricken at this unexpected happen¬ 
ing in your life. 

Your family doctor makes all the neces¬ 
sary calls. You hear him telling 
the surgeon all your symptoms, and you 
hear him say that you will be taken by 
him to the New Rochelle Hospital, a few 
miles away, which takes care of patients 
from New Rochelle, Larchmont and the 
Pelhams. 

Polly meets you at the hospital entrance, 
and your family doctor makes certain you 
are taken in by wheelchair, before he 
leaves you in the care of the hospital 
admitting office. Since your wife is there, 
you can be whisked right up to a bed in 
the two-patient semi-private room that 
has already been arranged for. She will 
answer all the admittance questions. 

By now, your surgeon has telephoned 
the floor nurse and instructed an im¬ 
mediate urine analysis and all the blood 
tests necessary in your type of case. A 
medical technologist comes in as soon as 
you are undressed and put to bed, and 
swabs your middle finger with alcohol. 
The finger is then punctured with a 
sterile lancet and a drop, of blood is 
squeezed into each of three microphipets 
(glass tubes), and onto a glass slide. 


The first drop of blood is used to 
determine the amount of hemoglobin, or 
coloring matter, in the blood. Another 
is used to determine the number of white 
cells or corpuscles—which should be be¬ 
tween five and ten million per cubic 
milimeter. The third drop of blood will 
determine the number of red blood cells 
which should range between four and five 
point two million. 

The blood on the slide is spread thinly 
on a film which is stained with aniline 
dyes and examined under a microscope 
to determine the types of white blood 
cells that are present. There are five types 
and there could be abnormalities in any 
one of them. 

If the patient is found to be anemic, 
blood is immediately secured from New 
Rochelle Hospital’s own blood bank, in 
case transfusions are necessary. 

Your blood type and RH factor are 
determined by taking additional blood 
specimen from your arm vein. 

In the urine analysis, the laboratory 
always has the patient void a specimen 
to be examined for albumen, sugar and 
acetone. The color and specific gravity 
are noted and it is tested for acid or 
alkali. A portion of the urine is tested to 
determine if there are pus cells or red 
cells jn it; the pys cells could indicate 
an infection anywhere in the urinary 

83 


tract from the kidneys to the bladder, and 
red blood cells would indicate that the 
person is losing blood from anywhere in 
that area. 

Immediately after the specimens of 
blood and urine are taken from you, ac¬ 
cording to the balance of the surgeon’s 
instructions, the nurse shaves you from 
your abdomen to the mid-thighs. 

When your surgeon arrives, he ex¬ 
amines you. He finds acute abdominal 
tenderness on pressure and the right 
lower quadrant of the abdomen also 
hurts when particularly pressed. Some¬ 
times there is pain referred from the other 
side to the right, and you feel that you 
hurt all over, but actually you don’t. 
Suddenly the doctor presses down on that 
particular area and lets go just as sud¬ 
denly and you gasp, it hurts so badly. 
This proves that there is peritoneal ir¬ 
ritation, meaning that the lining of the 
abdomen (called the peritoneum) and the 
organs there, are inflamed from the ap¬ 
pendix infection. Finally, your surgeon 
does a rectal examination so that he can 
feel the tenderness high on the right side. 

Summing up his examination and the 
twenty-four hour history, plus the fact 
that there is no past history of your ever 
having had gall bladder, perforated ulcer, 
kidney stone, or any related condition, 
this could only be appendicitis. There is 
just one condition that has the same 
symptoms—mesenteric adinitis, an inflam¬ 
mation of the nodes in that area—which 
would also be operable, and would auto¬ 
matically call for taking out the appendix 

If you were Allan A., your surgeon 
would then telephone your family doctor 
and tell him that it would be wise to 
book the operation for some time that day. 

Now that an operation has been de¬ 
cided upon you are given an injection to 
relieve pain. In this case Demerol will 
be used, although Dramamine is also 
used. Morphine is not used so much these 
days, particularly since many patients are 
allergic to it. Meanwhile, your surgeon 
has gone about choosing the anesthetist 
to work with him and this additional 
doctor has given orders to the floor nurse 


for pre-operative medication to supple¬ 
ment the anesthetic, to be given anywhere 
from three-quarters of an hour to an hour 
before the operating time. 

In the operating room there is usually 
an assistant to the surgeon, a hospital 
resident, a nurse to handle the tray and 
instruments, a circulating nurse who 
walks about getting things that are needed 
in addition, and the anesthetist. 

You’ve heard about doctors having to 
be made "sterile” before an operation, and 
you know darned well it has nothing 
to do with not being able to procreate. 
If you weren’t being made ready to come 
down to the operating room, you would 
find out that in this process your doctor 
disrobes completely, donning only an 
operating suit. In New Rochelle Hospital 
these are green. He even changes his 
shoes—the soles are conductors with a 
detachable arrangement on the heel to 
eliminate static in the use of various gases. 
Ditto anybody else who works in the 
operating room. Then he goes into the 
scrub room, adjacent to the operating 
room, and scrubs his fingers and hands 
up to the elbows with a brush and 
sterilizing soap. 


M eanwhile, you, Allan A., having been 
made partialy unconscious through 
the injections, are wearing a tie-back, 
knee-length hospital gown, cotton foot 
socks,.and have been wheeled to surgery. 
Here the anesthetist is inducing sleep with 
sodium penthathol, an intravenous injec¬ 
tion. Then the assistant exposes your 
abdomen, paints the area with Scott’s 
antiseptic solution and drapes it to expose 
only the operative section. 

You, as Allan A., were on the operat¬ 
ing table thirty-eight minutes for your 
operation. The incision was about three 
inches long. It went through the skin, 
subcutaneous tissue (fat), fascia, muscle, 
peritonium and through the abdominal 
cavity. Usually with a groin incision the 
cecum (the first portion of the large 
bowel), is immediately present; this is 
lifted with instruments and the exposed 
appendix is removed routinely. Then each 


layer is sewn in place with sterile catgut. 

Meanwhile, the appendix specimen has 
been sent to the pathology laboratory 
and there the pathologist dictates a gross 
description of the specimen, while por¬ 
tions of it are placed in a machine that 
processes the tissue so that it can be 
determined whether a healthy or infected 
appendix was removed and in your (Al¬ 
lan A.’s) case it was definitely infected. 

You are taken back to your room 
accompanied by the nurse and the anesthe¬ 
tist until you regain consciousness.- You 
are wearing an air-way rubber tube in 
your mouth between your teeth, so as to 
keep your tongue from going to the back 
of your throat and choking you. The 
moment you begin to awaken you will 
spit out the air-way automatically. 

Within a half-hour you have recovered 
enough consciousness to remove the air¬ 
way. You are a little restless and complain 
of pain in the operative site. The doctor 
has looked in on you once, and decided 
you are doing well enough to be per¬ 
mitted a sip of water every half-*hour. 

By the second day, you are allowed 
out of bed three or four times to accustom 
yourself to that exercise. Getting out of 
bed and sitting in a chair for an hour 
is no good, the doctor warns you. By the 
fifth day, you are feeling as good as new, 
and eating a regular diet, and on the 
sixth day your sutures are removed. 

By the sixth day, however, you’re rest¬ 
less, you’ve seen everything the hospital 
has to offer, and the summer weather is 
beckoning to you very openjy. Fortunately, 
your vacation comes just as your sick 
leave ends, so you can follow the doctor’s 
orders to take things easy for a month. 


E xactly a week from the day you enter¬ 
ed New Rochelle Hospital, Allan A., 
you leave it, well on the way to recovery, 
and almost sorry that you hadn’t known 
long ago how free from anxiety an 
operative experience could be. 

So if you, too, suddenly need an opera¬ 
tion, don’t fight it—accept it. Operations 
can be informative if you remember how 
efficient science is today! ■■ 


THE LADY WHO ATE MARINES continued from page 44 


gaping wounds were still oozing blood. 

Beside me, in the thick guinea grass 
concealing us from the cacos, Auguste, my 
scout comrade of the Garde shifted his 
carbine uneasily. 

"Atoin pr’ aller!" he whispered in my 
ear. "I am for going!" 

As senior scout, the decision was for 
me to make if there was to be one. I put 
my finger to my lips in warning, listening 
intently. The booming of the big Rada 
drum nearby, the measured thunder of 
taut goat-skin over a hollowed log of 
mapou, could not entirely drown the whip¬ 
like snaps of shooting further down on 
the dark green slope of Mount St. Michel. 

Somewhere far below us in the jungle 
shadows and along the narrow trail lead¬ 
ing to the village of Las Cahobas, two 
Marines of the ambushed patrol were 

84 


fighting a desperate rear-guard action 
against several pursuing cacos. With them, 
carried across the saddle of his horse, 
was a third Marine, Corporal Stone. He 
had been wounded and blinded in the 
fighting. 

With three men Sergeant Muth had left 
Las Cahobas before dawn and ridden up 
the Mount St. Michel trail. Far up the 
slope, before we could make contact with 
them, they had come upon two cacos who 
had fired upon the patrol and had then 
fled. They were Benoit’s men, decoys, and 
the pursuing patrol followed them straight 
into the ambush. 

Sergeant Muth was shot down in the 
first ragged volley. The other three began 
to return the fire. Suddenly a bullet grazed 
Stone’s neck and tore into the stock of his 
rifle, near the bolt. When he squeezed the 


trigger, the rifle exploded in his face, 
blinding him. After that the patrol had 
retreated, leaving the body of Sergeant 
Muth behind. 

"Moin pr’ aller!” Auguste whispered 
again. "If we hurry down the mountain 
we may be able to help them.” 

I shook my head. The orders which had 
come to us from Lieutenant Colonel Lit¬ 
tle’s headquarters at the Marine camp in 
Mirebalais, twenty-two miles away, were 
to find Benoit and keep an eye on him 
until reinforcements arrived to capture 
him. 

"No," I said. "The Marines will make 
it back to Las Cahobas." 

"Perhaps,” Auguste grunted skeptic¬ 
ally, "but there are many cacos!” 

He was right. Although several of the 
guerillas had left to follow the escaping 

ADVENTURE 



Marine patrol, at least a score had re¬ 
mained behind with Benoit in'the little 
clearing. We could observe them plainly 
through the gently waving guinea grass. 
And we could see the slender, half-qaked 
body of Victorin. 

The head of the sorceress was bound 
in a turban of flaming scarlet. Bare to the 
waist, she wore a small ouanga, a voodoo 
charm bag around her neck at the end of 
a loop of braided horse hair. 

As she danced around the body of 
Sergeant Muth to the slow beat of the 
Rada drum, Benoit and his cacos stood 
motionless behind the drummer. He was 
staring at her through narrowed eyes. His 
powerfully muscled body, stripped to the 
broad leather belt, glistened with sweat. 
In one hand he held a .45 rifle, in the 
other a razor-sharp machete. 

It was said in the mountains that Vic¬ 
torin gave herself freely to two masters. 
Her body to Benoit, a man of the flesh, 
her soul to Ogoun Badagris, the Dreaded 
One, voodoo god of evil. 

Because of this it was also said that 
Victorin was not a true mamaloi or 
priestess who respectfully worshipped all 
of the voodoo gods and served them well, 
but a sorceress and woman of evil. 

She paused, having completed her danc¬ 
ing circle around the body. Her feet had 
almost ceased to move. But her voluptu¬ 
ous hips, her curving thighs, continued to 
sway forward and back and from side to 
side in a maddening, pulse-stirring move¬ 
ment which gradually quickened to the 
urgent command of the drum. 

She turned her face upwards, eyes 
closed as if in ecstacy. Slowly she stretched 
out her arms, her hands palm up in a 
gesture of supplication. She appeared to 
be in a trance. 

"Ogoun Badagris,” she chanted sol¬ 
emnly, "take thy woman!” 

Suddenly she stopped abruptly. So did 
the beating of the drum. The spell 
had been broken by something. They 
were all staring downward at the body 
near the sorceress’ feet. 

Plainly, unmistably, I heard a low, 
moaning sound. Startled, I saw that the 
body was beginning to stir. Despite his 
two terrible wounds Sergeant Muth was 
still alive! 


"Auguste!” I whispered in horror. 

"No use, Mathieu,” even as I started 
to creep to the left Auguste pointed and 
I heard Benoit’s loud oaths. He was ad¬ 
vancing on Sergeant Muth, his machete 
swinging. Then he chopped downward. 

Blood spurted from the severed neck. 
The head rolled slowly on the ground 
stopping against the sorceress’ instep. 

Standing motionless, she began to in¬ 
tone the ancient chant of the culte des 
morts which is invoked when molesting 
the dead. 

"Eh! Eh! Canga li. V ana docki!” she 
began. "First take the brains to rub upon 
the sights of your rifles so that they may 
shoot true. Then build a fire and cook the 
heart so that having eaten of it neither 
the white man’s bullets nor his bayonets 
can harm you. Finally the liver which is 
to De eaten by Victorin. For it is the flesh 
of the dead which gives strength to the 
body of th>. living.” 

She had finished. For a few seconds 
there was utter silence among the cacos. 
They stood there, regarding her with the 
stunned awe which I have seen reserved 
for respected mamalois by the voodoo 
worshippers in the houmforts, or temples, 
amid the hills. 

True voodoo is a religion, make no 
mistake about it. But this Victorin was 
debasing and making a mockery of it. 
She was indeed an evil sorceress. 

"Francingue! Attendez!” 

Benoit’s booming voice broke the still¬ 
ness with a command. 

Francingue was Benoit’s lieutenant, a 
murderous butcher. He was short and 
wide with huge arms of incredible 
strength. A man of great cruelty. 

He stepped forward with a swagger, 
approached the severed head and raised 
his machete. There was a crooked grin on 
his thin lips. With one blow he split the 
skull in half as though it were a coconut. 

Auguste’s lips were to my ear, a trem¬ 
ble in his voice. But it was a tremble of 
indignation and of horror, not of fear for 
Auguste was a brave man. 

"It is too much, Mathieu! Let us kill 
them both now. I will take Francingue, 
you Benoit!” 

•He said this, knowing what the cacos 
would do to us afterwards. 


I, too, was sickened with anger. I was 
eager to act although knowing the savage 
revenge which would surely follow the 
killing of Benoit and Francingue. But I 
sternly held myself in check. We had our 
orders and we in the Garde had been 
taught to obey them. Benoit was to be 
taken by the Americans. Alive. 

We lay there concealed in the waving 
guinea grass while the cacos built a fire 
of dead pine and mapou branches. They 
dipped their fingers into the spongy 
sticky grayness of Sergeant Muth’s brains 
and carefully rubbed their finger-tips on 
their rifle sights. 

They held the Marine's dripping heart 
and liver over the leaping flame of the 
fire, skewered on machetes. We smelled 
the nauseating smell of cooking human 
flesh that had been quickly blackened, 
staring in horror as Francingue sliced the 
heart into small pieces. He threw a piece 
to each man as though they were so 
many dogs and respectfully offered a 
piece to Benoit. 

We watched then as Francingue brought 
the skewered liver to Victorin. She ac¬ 
cepted it with condescension. 

She sat well apart from the others, un¬ 
der a mapou tree. Soon afterwards Benoit 
joined her, a bottle of clairin, our color¬ 
less native rum in one of his great hands. 

There was a slight smile upon the 
face of the sorceress as she watched him 
drink greedily of the fiery liquid. Then he 
handed the bottle to her and she, too, 
drank deeply. 

Suddenly, while I was watching, she 
ceased to be the woman of Ogoun Bada¬ 
gris the Dreaded One. In a frenzy of pas¬ 
sion she flung aside her role of sorceress, 
becoming the woman of Benoit, the black 
giant. Their arms reached out for each 
other madly. And their two bodies came 
together and clung as if they were 


por some five hours Auguste and I had 
■ been lying concealed in the guinea 
grass beyond the clearing, not daring to 
move. It was now late afternoon. There 
was still no sign of a reinforced patrol 
coming up the mountain trail from the 
direction of Las Cahobas. 


MAY, 1957 


85 




All of this time we had been keenly on 
the alert, ready to carry, out our plan of 
action instantly. At the first sound or 
sight of a patrol from our point of ob¬ 
servation high over the trail, we intended 
to make our way swiftly downward 
through the forest and report the presence 
of Benoit and his cacos in the vicinity. 

But now, with the passage of time, it 
appeared almost certain that the wounded 
Corporal Stone and the other two Ma¬ 
rines, if they succeeded in reaching Las 
Cahobas, had not found reinforcements 
in the village. This meant but one thing. 
There would be a delay of several hours 
while they sent word back by courier to 
Lieutenant Colonel Little's headquarters 
in Mirebelais. 

"Alors!” Auguste groaned, glancing up 
at the sinking sun. "It is as I feared. The 
Marine patrol was wiped out by the cacos 
long before it reached Las Cahobas. 
Otherwise there would be many Ameri¬ 
cans down there on the trail right now.” 


I t was as if he had been reading my 
thoughts. It was time for us to act 
before Benoit left with his cacos and 
Victorin. 

"You carry the message back to the 
village,” I told him. "I shall remain near 
Benoit. If he moves further into the 
mountains I shall try to leave a trail for 
you to follow.” 

He nodded grimly and immediately be¬ 
gan to creep to the left, toward the 
shadowy concealment of the forest. 

Five minutes passed and all was still 
quiet. I was certain that Auguste had 
made his withdrawal without attracting 
the attention of the cacos. And then, sud¬ 
denly from the direction of the forest, I 
heard his carbine begin to fire. 

At the sound of the first shot cacos 
sprang to their feet and dashed toward 
the trees. Benoit and Francingue followed 
them. 

Now Auguste’s carbine was cracking 
again and again. I realized that he was 
selling his life dearly. 

Abruptly the sound of firing ceased. It 
was all over in a few minutes and the 
cacos were returning. The machete in 
Francingue’s hand was red and dripping. 
I knew that it was Auguste’s blood. 

"Search thoroughly!” I heard Benoit 
order his lieutenant. "When a- rat is 
found one seeks the nest for the others.” 

It was time for me to retreat before my 
avenue of escape was completely blocked 
off. 

Cautiously I backed away through the 
guinea grass and then to the side. I crept 
through the scrub less than ten yards 
from the mapou tree where Victorin was 
sitting. Another ten yards of crawling and 
I was in the woods. 

Now my progress was swifter. I knew 
Mount St. Michel well which was one of 
the reasons I had been chosen for this 
mission. I climbed downward through the 
forest in almost a straight line, coming 
out on the narrow, twisting trail to Las 
Cahobas far below. 

Keeping to the concealment of the foli¬ 
age which now had become tropical I 
was on the alert for cacos. As I advanced 


I came upon the bodies of dead ones, 

The first was under a banana tree by 
the side of the trail. The man was on his 
back, a bullet hole squarely between his 
sightless eyes. Jungle ants were swarming 
over him. A few hundred yards further 
on, near a tall St. Joseph’s Mantle (red 
poinsettia) I came upon two more of 
them. 

Altogether I counted the bodies of ten 
cacos sprawled out on the trail back to 
Las Cahobas. Two Marines, with a 
wounded and blinded comrade had ac¬ 
counted for all of them. The deaths of 
Sergeant Muth and of poor Auguste had 
been partly avenged. But until Benoit, 
Francingue and the evil sorceress, Victorin, 
were captured the debt would not be paid 
in full. 

Near Las Cahobas I met a full platoon 
of Marines on the trail. With them was 
Polycin Savan, another scout of the Garde. 
He told me that the Americans had re¬ 
ceived word of the fighting in Mirebalais 
and had started out from there im¬ 
mediately. 

I gave a full report to the lieutenant 
in command. He turned a little pale be¬ 
neath his bronzed face when I described 
how Sargeant Muth had been butchered 
and parts of him eaten. 

"But these cacos are cannibals,” he 
exclaimed wide-eyed, "and the witch 
woman too. Do you think Benoit is still 
up on the mountain?” 

"That is my belief, mon Lieutenant 

"It would be best for you to come 
along,” Polycin suggested. "You know 
the mountain better than I.” 

I volunteered for this new scouting mis¬ 
sion willingly. I still had a score to settle. 

With Polycin I led the way back up 
the trail and about half way up the 
mountain we came upon Francingue and 
twelve or thirteen of the cacos. We took 
them completely by surprise. They began 
to retreat immediately, at the same time 
returning our fire. 

"The short, wide one, mon Lieutenant!” 
I called out sharply. "He is the one called 
Francingue!” 

"So!” he answered and barked an order. 

I think Francingue suspected what was 
coming for he turned and began running 
toward the concealment of the foliage. 
He was a little too late. Several shots 
rang out, so close together they were 
almost a volley. Francingue, the bloody 
butcher, crashed downward into the 
thorny bahonde on his ugly face. 


%J|#ith Francingue dead, the others con- 
"■ tinued to fight a delaying action, 
sniping from the foliage as we advanced. 
Their marksmanship was poor; we killed 
eight cacos. The others fled. 

The sun had set by now. A big three- 
quarter moon was climbing over the 
mountain top as we approached the clear¬ 
ing. Ahead was only the stillness of death. 

We came upon the body of Auguste, 
his head and right arm severed. Then I 
led the lieutenant and Polycin to what 
was left of the mutilated body of Ser¬ 
geant Muth. 

The American stared, then turned away 
quickly. He swore bitterly under his 


breath. "Goddamned voodoo cannibals!” 

Polycin and I exchanged glances. 

"Non, they are not .voodoo worshippers, 
mon Lieutenant,” Polycin said softly. 

We knew that we could not make him 
understand. It was difficult- then, as it is 
sometimes even now, to explain to Ameri¬ 
cans that voodooism does not condone 
-cannibalism. 

All that night Polycin and I guided 
units of the Marine platoon over Mount 
St. Michel, making a thorough search. 
But we found no trace of Benoit or the' 
sorceress, Victorin. 

On the following day we received re¬ 
inforcements. Several additional patrols 
and some light cannon were brought to 
the base of Mount St. Michel. The pa¬ 
trols fanned out on the hunt. Cannon 
shells pounded into the thick bahonde, the 
green-black valleys and the crests of steep 
mornes, wherever we thought it likely 
that Benoit might be hidden. 

For many days the hunt continued. 
Then, on May 9,‘1920, almost a month 
later, Benoit was surprised by a patrol 
led by Sergeant Passmore and scouted by 
Beran. They had come upon him near 
Bois Pin in the Mirebelais area. He had 
died fighting, with all of his caco fol¬ 
lowers. 

I said to Beran: "What of his woman, 
the sorceress, Victorin? Did she also die?” 

"Pas que je sache,” he said with a shrug. 
"We saw her at Benoit’s side when the 
fighting began. We did not find her among 
the bodies afterwards. But the Marines 
appear to be satisfied.” 

We returned to routine patrol. For al¬ 
most five months Victorin was all but 
forgotten. 

And then, on a day in November, we 
received an alert. Pilot Clarence E. Mor¬ 
ris, Squadron E, first Division, Marine 
Aviation Force was missing. Flying an 
afternoon reconnaissance with Lieutenant 
McFayden, he had made a forced landing 
north of the village of Maissade when the 
engine went dead. 

He had remained to guard the plane 
while McFayden hiked for eight hours 
along the jungle trail to Hinche, a Marine 
post. When he returned to the plane 
with a Marine patrol and mechanics, 
Morris had disappeared. So had most of 
the plane. Not only had it been stripped 
of its Lewis gun and ammunition drums 
but everything which could be detached, 
even the wings, were gone. 

Once again the patrols were out search¬ 
ing. To us of the Garde, who did the 
scouting for them, it seemed incredible 
that so much of the plane could vanish 
with Morris and not leave a trace. Yet for 
more than a week our hunt was fruitless. 


E ight days later, scouting along the ridge 
of a steep morne, we captured a 
young caco named Patou. He spoke no 
English and he was terribly frightened 
that we would torture him. 

"Question him!” Sergeant Whaley or¬ 
dered. 

"The white bat has been eaten,” Patou 
told me. "We captured him alive in a 
clearing. Our leader, Cadeus Bellegarde, 
commanded us to take the white bat back 


86 


ADVENTURE 


to his woman, the sorceress Victorin. 

"Then Victorin looked upon the white 
bat and spoke to Ogoun Badagris^ the 
Dreaded One whose woman she also was. 
She told us to kill the white bat and Ca-' 
deus Bellegarde chopped off his head. She 
told us to bring the wings of the white 
bat and make a fire of them, placing the 
body in the flames.” 

Patou led us to a deep cleft in the 
morne. There we found the ashes of a fire. 
In them were metal pieces of plane wing. 
Nearby was a rusting Lewis gun and hu¬ 
man bones—Lieutenant Morris’ bones. 

Now we were hunting intensively for 
the new leader, Cadeus Bellegarde and 
Victorin the sorceress who had become 
his woman. Patrols were ranging through¬ 
out the mountains and then, a few days 
later, once again it happened! 

This time the victim who was eaten was 
Private Henry Lawrence, a Marine in the 


scouting patrol of Lieutenant Louis J. 
Cukela, Second Regiment, First Brigade. 
Deep in the jungle beyond Mirebalais, he 
had lost contact with his patrol and had 
been captured and killed by Bellegarde. 

A month passed. One day a Garde 
scout discovered the whereabouts of Belle¬ 
garde and led a Marine patrol to him. 
He was captured alone. The sorceress, 
Victorin, had disappeared. 

Bellegarde was brought back to Port 
au Prince and placed on trial before a 
military court of Marines. Since he wasn't 
an American citizen he was turned over 
to the Haitian authorities and thrown 
into prison. 

But we who were in the Garde and 
been born in Haiti knew that the death of 
the caco leader, Benoit, and the imprison¬ 
ment of Bellegarde would not put an end 
to cannibalism. Not as long as the evil 
sorceress, Victorin, was alive to make a 


THE NIGHT I LOOKED INTO HELL continued from page 


clipped off the miles. I tried to picture 
what faced me when I reached the scene. 

As "B” shift commander of the Los 
Angeles Fire Department’s Battalion Six, 
the harbor battalion, I am responsible for 
all alarms turned in from the city’s more 
than forty-five miles of tightly-packed 
waterfront warehouses, marine terminals, 
and residential areas surrounding it. 

Los Angeles is one of the world’s largest 
seaports, and being a major oil center too, 
the hazards of petroleum and a myriad 
of other dangerous chemicals moving in 
and out of the harbor around the clock al¬ 
ways gave me nightmares when I thought 
what could happen if something went 
wrong. I often worried that I might not be 
capable of handling a disaster. I got my 
answer that night when I saw enough 
smoke and flame to last me a lifetime. 

Nearing the harbor I picked up the 
microphone on the dashboard. "Division 
One to San Pedro,” I radioed. "Have you 
a better location yet on the fire?” 

The dispatcher told me to respond to 
the foot of Pier A Street. What had hap¬ 
pened was spread out in front of me 
when I reached Pier A and Neptune Place. 
Exactly why and how it happened will 
forever remain a mystery. 

Lying across a wide slip from me was 
a 10,000-ton oil tanker, the Markay, at 
the Shell Marine Oil Terminal Berth 
Number 173. Only a small part of her bow 
was visible through the mountain of flame 
capped with gobs of thick black smoke 
boiling hundreds of feet into the air. 

A violent explosion in one of the storage 
compartments just forward of the mid-’ 
ship house had, like a massive axe, chop¬ 
ped through the thick iron plating, slicing 
the tanker clear down to her keel. Out 
of the gaping death wound gushed thous : 
ands of barrels of flaming petroleum by¬ 
products. This vast spill fanned out across 
the water and in seconds bridged the slip 
and began chewing into creosote-soaked 
pilings and timbers supporting the wharf 
on which I stood. 

The explosion had blown down part of 
an immense American President Lines 


transit shed, sending it clear across the 
slip from the tanker. We found the blast 
had also snapped the sprinkler system 
which could have saved the long and 
slender building. A good part of the mas¬ 
sive barn-like shed was already glowing 
cherry red as the flames hurried through 
stacks of general cargo and headed for 
dozens of highly explosive liquified petro : 
leum gas cylinders. 

Looking off down the wharf I saw six 
hoselines manned by first-arriving com¬ 
panies who were fighting a disheartening- 
ly futile battle against the flames spread¬ 
ing unchecked through the transit shed, 
and the wharf underneath. The full im¬ 
pact of the problem facing me was driven 
forcibly home when I looked down off the 
pierhead and saw the pride of our bat¬ 
talion, Fireboat Number Two, throwing its 
full weight against the flames—12,000 
gallons of water per minute—from massive 
turret water guns, some with nozzles as 
big as four inches in diameter. But the 
flames only shrugged off our fireboat’s 
pounding as if the streams of water had 
the force of mere water pistols. 


To my right and left across Slip Number 
■ One the sea of fire was reaching out 
toward the Texaco Marine Oil Terminal 
and the huge Pacific Coast Borax plant. 
If the flames bent around the pierhead 
on my side of the slip they’d surely ig¬ 
nite the double-decker wharf of the Union 
Oil Company. Across the Turning Basin 
was the sprawling tank farm of Standard 
Oil. If the fire floated over there we’d 
be done for. 

I radioed: "Division Number One to 
San Pedro . . . Send me six more engine 
companies.” 

As Bowen turned the car around so I 
could head over to the Shell terminal side 
to check on conditions, I noticed the 
wharf was littered with twisted chunks 
of iron plating, ship fittings and inch- 
thick rivets vomited by the Markay. We 
raced back up Pier A Street, through the 
hundreds of spectators attracted for miles 


gruesome mockery of voodoo worship. 

We continued to hunt for her and one 
morning, high on a morne near the sum¬ 
mit of Mount St. Michel, Polycin and I 
came upon her where we suspected that 
she had been hiding. 

She was walking along the ridge. Her 
head was bound in a turban of flaming 
scarlet, her lithe, dusk-golden body half 
naked and silhouetted against the bright 
blueness of the morning sky. 

Over the sights of his carbine Poly¬ 
cin whispered to me, half-mockirigly, 
half serious: "Do you think, mon ami, 
that Ogoun Badagris will now turn aside 
our bullets?” 

"I think not,” I whispered back and 
then we both squeezed our triggers. 

She fell forward and down—almost a 
thousand feet into the green-black depths 
of the canyon far below. 

And her bones are still there. ■ ■ 


around, and turned down Fries Avenue 
where I met Acting Battalion Chief Rus¬ 
sell Biegel outside the Shell plant. The 
shimmering glow turned night into day 
and his grimy face glistened. 

"How’s it look on this side?” I asked. 

"Not good. I pulled a third alarm the 
minute I arrived.” 

I squinted through the inferno and made 
out the outlines of two 40,000 barrel 
storage tanks dangerously close to the 
churning flames. Unless I acted fast those 
tanks were certain to blow. 

"Get some lines on those tanks,” I or¬ 
dered. "Try to cool them.” 

Two companies of men climbed on top 
of the tanks and the radiated heat was 
so great that the lids heaved up and down. 

Biegel and I got into my car and Bowen 
drove us down the narrow street lined 
with fifteen-foot high retaining dikes 
separating Shell and Texaco, so we could 
see how far the fire had spread into the 
adjacent terminal. As we got out I turned 
to Bowen.’ 

"Better swing the car around now while 
we still can get out of here easily,” I told 
him. "We might have to get out in a 
hurry.” 

Biegel and I were running down the 
street and by shielding our faces from the 
savage heat, managed to get fifty feet 
past the Shell terminal gate when the 
fire touched off another compartment 
aboard the Markay. The whooshing roar 
and blinding flash was followed by a 
huge gob of flame that stopped us dead 
in our tracks. A searing wave of heat 
slapped my forehead. Biegel and I started 
to run for our lives and I expected to die 
at any moment, but when I looked up I 
saw the explosion had miraculously not 
spread the fire, though the flames were 
more intense. 

I found a terminal official and I asked 
him, "What’s in that tanker’s compart¬ 
ments?” 

"She’s been loading gasoline and butane 
blend. We shut down the pumps the min¬ 
ute she blew.” 

"How much fuel is aboard her?” 


MAY, 1957 


87 



"Better than a hundred and fifty thous¬ 
and barrels,” he said grimly. 

I knew we could pump the harbor dry 
and still not batter a wedge in the solid 
pillar of flame bellowing up from that 
floating cauldron. 

My main problem, in fact the one that 
would spell victory or defeat for us, was 
to head off the sea of flame splashed 
across the slip and to stop the raging fire 
under the wharfs and in the transit shed. 

Leaving Biegel in charge at the Shell 
terminal I hurried back around to the APL 
shed side, trying to figure out en route 
how I could accomplish what a dozen 
hand-lines and Fireboat Two had so far 
been unable to do. It’s an axiom of fire¬ 
fighting that you can never put out a 
waterfront blaze involving a wharf unless 
you first kill the fire underneath it. 

When I arrived at the transit shed I 
found that the flames were racing un¬ 
hampered through the timbers and pilings 
underneath. Whole chunks of pavement 
inside the shed were melting and dropping 
down into the flaming water, thus opening 
up new flues for the fire. 

It would have been murder for me to 
order my men onto the flame-threatened 
wharf which momentarily might collapse, 
nor did I dare move apparatus onto it for 
fear the supports would collapse the floor¬ 
ing and drop both men and equipment 
into the water. The unburned wharf was 
too thick to attempt to chop through so 
we could get special nozzles working. I 
knew, too, that by the time our pneu¬ 
matic hammers opened a hole big enough 
to enable us to lower firemen, the flames 
might be a hundred feet behind us. 

After quickly weighing all possibilities 
I knew there was only one way to stop 
that fire. Somehow we had to maneuver 
Fireboat Two through the swirling sea of 
smoke and flame to the north end of the 
wharf, ahead of the fire, then cut off 
its advance and slowly drive the flames 
back into the burned out area. I didn’t 
know how I could do it without putting 
the boat and its crew in grave danger, but 
I had no alternative. 

"As soon as possible,” I radioed the 
boat, which was still barely holding her 
own at the pierhead, "or when you see 
a break in the smoke and fire, make a 
run for it up Slip Number One to the 
north end of the APL sheds.” 


The deafening roar of the flames and 
the boat’s engines throbbing at full ca¬ 
pacity drowned out my message. I repeated 
it three times before Pilot Brainard Gray 
and Acting Captain Jack Gordon under¬ 
stood me. 

The crew turned the boat’s bow turret 
down and swept the flaming water away 
from the craft as it battled to plow a 
fire-free path. The heat cracked pilot house 
windows and the smoke got so thick that 
Gray could not see his compass. They 
backed out. Twice more the boat tried to 
find a way through and each time the 
flames repulsed her thrusts. 

Meanwhile, Chief Engineer John H. Al- 
derson and Assistant Chief Frank Winkler 
arrived and after mapping battle strategy 
we radioed for six more engine companies 
to cover threatened exposures. Boat One 
chugged in from Fish Harbor and our 
fleet of fireboats was joined by Navy 
and Coast Guard tugs. 

I decided to go aboard Fireboat Two 
where I could better see the problem of 
how to force our way up the slip. 

"We’ve got to get through somehow,” 
I told Gordon. "Let’s try just once more. 
We’ll edge along the wharf, all the while 
keeping our starboard side as distant from 
the Markay as possible. Have our bow 
turret gun and rail standees push the fire 
on top of the water away from us as 
we go through.” 

We began to feel our way into the bil¬ 
lowing cloud of smoke and fire. The heat 
was intense and I waited for more pilot 
windows to break. I wondered what would 
happen if a stray spark ever found its way 
below deck and reached our gasoline- 
powered engines. 

Our mighty streams bored into the boil¬ 
ing flames and the turrets swept the burn¬ 
ing waters of the slip. Suddenly the smoke 
lifted slightly, enough for me to spot a 
slender path free of fire. 

We bolted through the narrowing path 
and for a time the flames tried to swallow 
us, but we swept them from our hull. 
I held my breath for what seemed an 
eternity, but at last we pulled through 
the malestrom and shot into clear waters. 

I knew the crewmen had little energy 
left after this supreme test of their endur¬ 
ance. Flicking on the public address horn 
aboard the boat I called to shore for a 
detail of six men from land companies 


to meet us when we put into the wharf. 

Dawn was nearly upon us as we eased 
against the wharf and took on a fresh 
crew. I jumped aShore to set up heavy 
duty equipment which land companies had 
been readying for use the moment we 
maneuvered the boat through to the north 
end of the fire. 

"Boat-tender Twenty-one!” I called. 
"Get your wagon battery to work on the 
inside of this transit shed. Drive her right 
in there.” I also ordered a portable moni¬ 
tor into operation so as to give us two 
powerful battering ram streams that could 
safely work their way down the top of • 
the wharf as Fireboat Two drove a wedge 
intp the fire underneath. 

Everything aboard our boat then opened 
up on the flames. The engines throbbed 
mightily as we hammered with every ounce 
of horsepower at our command at the fire. 
Slowly we began to pound holes in what 
had been an impenetrable wall. Fortunate¬ 
ly there was little wind blowing or we 
would never had gotten a foothold. The 
fight was hard, but when I squinted 
through the smoke pouring up from the 
creosoted pinnings I saw we were winning. 
After a while the pungent black smoke 
turned to a dirty white color, and I knew 
we had the fire licked. On the land side. 
Boat Tender Two advanced and firemen 
moved the portable monitor along with it 
through the shed. With the fire on the APL 
side gradually being brought under control 
we could move in to sweep the fire on 
top of the water back toward the Markay, 
while other boats pounded the flames 
aboard the tanker and battled to keep 
intact compartments cool. Slowly the fire 
conceded defeat, but we weren’t able to 
go aboard the Markay for two days. 

The carnage below decks was appalling. 
Most of the dead were asleep in their 
bunks when the Markay blew. We found 
nine corpses down there and Boat Three 
found a tenth floating in the water. The 
coroner was never able to tell us exactly 
how many were killed. His final tally 
stood at twelve, counting a pile of 
charred bone fragments we found in the 
tanker’s radio shack. 

I was hardly conscious of the time when 
my relief came and I wearily dragged my¬ 
self home but I knew I’d never again have 
doubts of our ability to cope with disaster 
in the Harbor Battalion. ■ ■ 


88 


ADVENTURE 










THE LAST PASSWORD continued from page 34 


Yeah, a tough boy, all right. He found 
that his fists were clenched and he un¬ 
clenched them. 

"No doubt you men are wondering 
just where in hell you are,” said General 
Hawkins. "Also, why the army picked 
you for duty in this unknown, uncom¬ 
fortable place. Well, I must tell you that 
the answer to the first question, where 
you are, will never be answered. We* 
brought you here by a roundabout route. 
We put you in a plane with the windows 
covered. When you landed here, you 
landed at night and were immediately 
moved into a car which drove you to the 
barracks . . .” 

Some barracks, thought Private Tony 
Donato in bewilderment. A cave in the 
side of a mountain. Some front yard, a 
big, hot and empty desert, fust sand. 
Sand, stone and lizards. Tony knew they 
could be anywhere, anywhere in the world. 

"But,” said General Hawkins’ voice 
tuning into Tony's consciousness again, 
"We find it necessary to tell you why you 
are here.” Slowly General Hawkins looked 
around meeting each soldier’s eyes with a 
probing stare. "You are here to do guard 
duty. The toughest guard duty on earth. 
Hidden in the side of this mountain is a 
huge cave. In it are a number of hydro¬ 
gen bombs. 

”1 need hardly tell you,” said the Gen¬ 
eral softly, "what desperate efforts are 
being made by potential enemies to locate 
and sabotage this place. You have been 
carefully screened and checked for de¬ 
pendability. It is important that you know 
how special a group of men you are, how 
heavy your responsibility.” 

The General stared at them and as he 
stared lines of weariness seemed to appear 
around his eyes and mouth, making him 
seem more bitter and tougher than ever. 
"Don’t let me down, men. Don’t let your 
people, your country down.” Suddenly he 
straightened and nodded. He said crisply, 
“Your special training will now begin.” 


S tretched out on his cot days later, ach¬ 
ing in every muscle, Tony stared so¬ 
berly at the wooden ceiling. Above it, he 
knew, was solid rock but the ceiling gave 
an illusion necessary to avoid claustro¬ 
phobia. Tony closed his eyes wearily. He 
knew now the nature of solid rock, the 
unyielding quality of it, because slowly 
his heart and spirit were being turned 
into the equivalent. It was necessary. It 
was necessary because, as General Haw¬ 
kins had pointed out in lectures, they, the 
guards, were the weakest link in the bar¬ 
rier. It was inevitable. 

"You must understand,” General Haw¬ 
kins had said, "that the shrewdest minds 
on earth will be, are being, brought to 
bear on how to get past you and destroy 
those hydrogen bombs. So we must'elimi¬ 
nate this weak link.” 

Strange, thought Tony in dull weari¬ 
ness, how they’d gone about this. They 
had a small and luxurious movie theatre 


in which the latest movies were shown 
three times a week. There was a superbly 
furnished music room with an unbeliev¬ 
able library' of records, everything from 
chamber music to Rock’n’Roll. And the 
food! They ordered from menus and were 
served, anything from two-inch sirloin 
steak medium-rare to spare-ribs char¬ 
coaled to exquisite crispness. 


I t was a mighty sweet setup all right, 
what with the guards all being made, 
sergeants, and having to be on guard duty 
for only two hours at a time so their 
alertness wouldn’t dim. It would have 
been a soldier’s paradise except for one 
thing: the disappearances. Tony felt his 
stomach churn as he tried to figure it out. 
He stared at the ceiling, thinking hard. 
Ten soldiers had come in his group. After 
one day there were nine. Nobody knew 
where the fellow—his name was Jessup, 
Paul Jessup—had gone. He’d made no 
goodby; just had his footlocker empty 
and was gone when they returned from 
their duty at the various lonely tunnel 
entrances. Nobody seemed to know what 
happened to him. Even the instructors 
looked surprised and blank, didn’t, in 
fact, seem to even remember Jessup. What 
was this, some kind of crazy game? 

It happened two more times. One man 
Tony had liked and missed a lot, a fellow 
named Harry, a corporal before they made 
him sergeant. Tony, staring now at the 
ceiling, felt a thickness in his throat. He 
sat up, as a soft bell rang out from the 
corridor outside, signalling the class given 
by General Hawkins himself. 

I’m going to ask the General what hap¬ 
pened to Harry, thought Tony as he 
reached for his jacket. The classroom was 
small, compact, with just enough room 
for the seven soldiers plus three empty 
chairs. General Hawkins was in front 
before a blackboard. 

"All right now,” said General Hawkins, 
"let’s get started. You,” he pointed to 
one of the soldiers, "you are on duty. 
You hear footsteps down the tunnel. Two 
men appear, one of them you recognize 
as an important civilian official in Wash¬ 
ington; his picture has been in all the pa¬ 
pers. They do not have the password but 
they do carry my authentic signature 
signed to a note telling you to let them in¬ 
side the storage room. What do you do?” 

"They don’t get through, sir. I put my 
rifle on them and hold them while sound¬ 
ing the alarm bell,” said the soldier. 

"Right,” said General Hawkins briskly. 
-"And why?” 

"You may have signed the note under 
duress, sir,” said the soldier. "Rule eight 
of our manual states: Only the password 
properly given shall admit any person, 
civilian or military to the storeroom even 
if bearing other proof of authority or 
permission." 

At this moment the door opened and a 
messenger hurried in, with a note which 
General Hawkins read rapidly. He looked 


up and spoke tersely, "There’ll be no 
class tomorrow morning. We’ll resume 
the day after.” 

He walked out calling over his shoul¬ 
der, "Dismissed.” Tony stared after him 
with disappointment. He would have to 
wait to find out about Harry. 

They saw a good movie that night, a 
comedy which had the soldiers howling. 
But Tony, right in the middle of his 
laughter, found a sudden thought plagu¬ 
ing him which stopped his mirth immedi¬ 
ately. It flashed unbidden from his sub¬ 
conscious like a neon sign in the dark. 
If a guy turns out to be no good for this 
job, he thought feeling sick, they can't 
just reassign him. He knows too much. 
What would they do with him? Immedi¬ 
ately Tony knew the three missing men 
had turned out unsatisfactory. And fe¬ 
verishly, putting his mind to what he 
would decide if fie were a general, Tony 
looked in full dread at the inevitable 
conclusion. I’d call them psyche and lock 
them up, or I’d have to shove them way 
off somewhere where they could never 
talk to anybody. 

Tony got up and walked out of the 
theatre. He went to his bunk and lay 
down, holding his aching head. The next 
day Tony was on duty at the tunnel en¬ 
trance when he heard the car outside 
grind to a halt. General Hawkins ap¬ 
peared looking as if he hadn’t slept all 
night. His face grim, the General strode 
toward the entrance, clutchihg some docu¬ 
ments in his hand. 

"Halt,” cried Tony automatically. "And 
give the password.” 

General Hawkins brushed by him im¬ 
patiently. "Haven’t got it this morning 
Sergeant,” he called over his shoulder. 
"I’ve been on flight and missed the brief¬ 
ing. Glad you’re on the ball though 

"Halt!” snarled Tony, swinging his 
rifle, aiming it. "You don’t go through 
without the password.” He aimed straight 
at the general’s heart. 


neral Hawkins stopped. His face be¬ 
came scarlet. 

"Listen you fool," he said in a menac¬ 
ing voice. "Put that gun down or I’ll have 
you court martialed. Back to your post.” 

General Hawkins marched on down 
the tunnel to the storeroom. 

Tony said in a strangled voice, "Halt. 
Halt.” And then he pulled the trigger. 
As the shot reverberated and echoed. 
General Hawkins spun around and fell. 
General Hawkins got up grinning rue¬ 
fully. He limped back to Tony who was 
standing there frozen. "Don’t worry, 
boy,” Said General Hawkins as he opened 
his bulky overcoat and examined the bul¬ 
let proof vest under it. "I’m okay.” 

He looked at Tony. "You did right,” 
said the General. "You passed the last 
test, the way the other three did. And 
now we’ll send you to where the hydrogen 
bombs really are hidden.” ■ 8 


MAY, 1957 


89 


ask: 



ADVE XTURE 


WHO ARE THE INDIAN POLICE? 

Some time ago I read in a book or maga¬ 
zine about the Indian Police. This organiza¬ 
tion was merely mentioned and not described 
in any way. Can you inform me whether 
there is any literature dealing with this 
force, and if not, give me some information 
about its history? 

L. U. Gunnerfeldt 

Wayne, Mich. 


Frankly, I have no information regarding- 



fiction stories only. 

The brief references I have seen would 
indicate that it was a force of police, re¬ 
cruited from Indians, to maintain law and 
order on the Indian reservations. If there 
ever actually was such a force, to the best 
of my knowledge, it no longer exists. 

You might be able to get the information 
you desire if you write to: The Bureau of 
Indian Affairs, Washington 25, D. C. 

Francis H. Bent 


TAKE THE FAMILY HIKING 


My family and 1 enjoy "ramblingf* through 
the country for recreation, exercise, and just 
plain curiosity, but have been "road-bound" 
by our lack of knowledge of hiking and 
self-preservation outside of settled areas. 

Could you recommend some references 
where we could find out about this subject 
or give us some information yourself? 

A. H. Bennett 


Athens, Tenn. 


Although I don't know whether your 
"family" consists of pre-school children or 
grandparents, either group can certainly go! 
When my oldest boy was a year old I cut 
holes in a knapsack for his legs and carried 
him like a papoose all over the Ramapo 
Mountains when they were really wild and 


when I wanted to get a stove up to a log 
cabin I built, I had to carry it up piece by 
piece as you couldn't get a wagon up. On 
the other hand, I’ve met a seventy year old 
grandma on a portage in Canada carrying 
her share of the duffle over the ridge. 

Now there’s an idea I'd suggest to you 
for the family outing of a lifetime, a ten- 
day canoe trip through Quetico Forest. It 
is one of the few roadless areas with moose, 
bear or deer easy to see as well as all the 
smaller wildlife and millions of birds. It is 
not expensive and not dangerous, but it 
requires the ability to read a compass and 
a map and reasonably vigorous health to 
traverse it safely. 

I have written about what it does for 
family life in magazines like "Household,” 
"Open Road,” "Hunting and Fishing” and 
even for English outdoor magazines and 
have received hundreds of letters from folks 
thanking me for suggesting it. You can get 
complete information on this vacation, free, 
by writing Bill Rom, Canoe Country Out¬ 
fitters, Ely, Minnesota, who will send you 
maps and photographs of the area. 

You live very near the great highway from 
Georgia to Maine and so near its sponsor, 
Paul M. Fink in Tennessee’s Jonesboro. 
Write Paul about the best areas near you 
for some of these family-break-in hikes. 

Another trick of ours when we move 
(we've lived in over twenty states) is to 
write the State Highway Department for an 
inch-to-the-mile map of counties that look 
pretty deserted on road maps. On those 
maps they have every house, store, mine, 
bog, creek and lake. It’s good winter eve¬ 
ning fun tracing out a possible route to ex¬ 
plore some marsh or lake not reached by a 
road. Drive down the country lane nearest 
it and park off the road. Make it a family 
all-day hike the first time; an overnight the 
next. It may be so attractive you’ll want to 
build a lean-to for a permanent base the 

Unfortunately, there is a dearth of ma¬ 
terial on hiking, and most of that is out of 
date. I’ve written a number of stories for 
the American Medical Association and a 
newspaper syndicate on being comfortable 
in the outdoors, but I have no copies at 
hand. AMA in Chicago might still have 


some copies of my "Be Comfortable in the 
Outdoors.” You’ll get a lot of good from the 
merit badge pamphlets of the Senior Scouts 
on hiking, woodcraft and similar outdoor 
activity. Write for a list of the Scout hand¬ 
books; they average about 35c each. You 
can order direct if you do not have a Scout 
store there. Don’t sneer at going to the 
Boy Scouts of America for information. Some 
of my senior troop saw action in Korea and 
tell me that some of the woodcraft they 
learned as scouts djd them more good dur¬ 
ing that terrible retreat than the skimpy 
boot camp training the Marines gave them. 

The Gallien Road Equipment company 
gives out a free folder on how to forecast 
weather using the clouds and wind direction. 
Dr. Irving Krick who can be reached 
through the California Institute of Tech¬ 
nology puts out a slide rule for $2.50 that 
I use and so does our local radio weather 
forecaster. 

For first-aid I’d turn to the Scouts again 
or the Red Cross manual. An accredited 
operator from either will do you more good 
in an emergency than a doctor. 

One thing I’d emphasize as the most im¬ 
portant: before you vanish into the wilder¬ 
ness for any extended period have a com¬ 
plete check-up by both doctor and dentist 
and if you have any history of tenderness 
at McBirney’s point, I'd seriously consider 
having the appendix out first. Use Halizone 
tablets for suspicious water or ten drops of 
a household bleach such as Purex, Chlorox 
(sodium-hypochlorite) to a gallon. When 
allowed to stand for five minutes and stirred 
to dissipate the chlorine the result is safe 
and delicious water. If you get a campfire 
burn don’t douse it with any of the unguents 
or goo that is sold for that purpose. A 
sterile bandage that the air can get through 
is much safer. 

The perils of long hikes are largely in 
not evaluating the next move. You reach 
up for a new handhold and the ledge 
crumbles away, or you pet a snake, or you 
step into a deep ford and suddenly are over 
your head with a knapsack turning you 
upside down, or you get lost and panic, etc. 
Bear in mind the Boy Scout motto: "Be 
Prepared." 

Austin H. Phbi.ps 



90 


ADVENTURE 






YOU GET ALL THIS NEWEST 
PRACTICAL EQUIPMENT 

« Parts to build a modern TV set, including 
all tubes plus a large screen Picture Tube 
t Parts to build a powerful Superhet Receiver, 
standard broadcast and short wave 

• Parts to conduct many experiments and build 
Continuity Checker, RF Ocillator, TV Circuits, 
Audio Oscillator, TRF Receiver, Signal Generator 

• A Valuable Professional Multitester 


YOUR NATIONAL SCHOOLS TELERAM A COURSE COVERS ALL 8 PHASES 


YOU ARE NEEDED IN THE TELEVISION-ELECTRONICS-RADIO INDUSTRY! — ,/nany other materials and services 
You can build a secure future for yourself if you get into Elec- ~ consultation privilege with our 
tronics NOW! Today’s shortage of trained technicians creates ^ 0 a y ^ n( Service" EVERYTHING 
tremendous opportunities. National Schools Shop-Method trained YOU NEED for outstanding success 
technicians are in constant and growing demand for high-pay jobs in Electroni cs. 
in Broadcasting and Communications, Electronic Research, v 

icing and Repair, and many other branches. TRAINING AT lOS M*G^^p 

Let National Schools, a Resident course. You can handle sales, si 
Technical School for over 50 years ing, manufacturing, or make good 1 
n you for today’s unlimited op- money in your own business. SEND | 
portunities in electronics! Our Shop FOR FACTS TODAY! 

T I Fr h HNiriAM y °r!fm^l p a f iK A Mn E m EARN AS YOU LEARN. Many of o 
TECHNICIAN. Completely up to students earn their entire tu / tion and 

i Spare Time jobs we show 
o do while learning. 

of the industry quickly, clearly and YOU GET EVERYTHING YOU NEED — 


correctly. You can master the most Clear, profusely illustrated lessons, 
modern projects, such as Color TV, shop-tested manuals, modern circuit 
printed circuits — even prepare for diagrams, practical job projects — all 
FCC License without taking a special the valuable equipment shown above 


i 

| sionalty .™' e 0 « e red by any school. 
I piete faciWies ouere jr S person a 
K Expert, 1 r,en JViluate Employment 

ft attention. Graduate c v near 

ft | er vice. Help >" * h ,le you 

I s'sys* 

■ information^^ 

■ If 


|GIT FAST SERVICE-MAIL NOW TO OFFICE NEAREST YOU! ■ 
NATIONAL SCHOOLS. DEPT. R3F-57 I 

MOO S. FIGUEROA ST. 187 N. LA SALLE ST. ■ 

LOS ANGELES 37, CALIF. °* CHICAGO 1, ILL. I 
Rush free TV-Radio “Opportunity” Book and sample | 
lesson. No salesman will call. ■ 


NATIONAL SCHOOLS 



































Make Money! lust 8 Easy Orders a Day 
Bring You Up to $960 a Month! 

From the moment you step into Mason’s revolutionary new Ripple Sole shoes, things start to happen. People 
stop you on the street... want to know where they can buy this amazingly different kind of shoe. And there are 
plenty of good reasons why you’ll sell Mason Ripple Sole Shoes on sight. First, they are so different. No one has 
ever seen anything like'em! These are the shoes that give shock-reducing gliding action ... forward thrust... to 
every step you take. More comfortable, because they feature Mason's famous Aif Cushion inpersoles. Every¬ 
one wants’em! 

But Ripple Sole shoes are only one of many exciting new features in the powerful Selling Outfit I’ll send you 
FREE! Using this outfit in the way I’ll show you, you can earn as much as $960 EXTRA monthly on just 8 easy orders 
a day! I'll set you up in a "Shoe Store Business” you can run from home. You'll have no expenses. You’ll never 
have to invest one cent. Yet you keep 100% of the profit! No wonder James Kelly of Ohio made $93.55 selling 
Mason Nationally-Advertised shoes-in a single evening! No wonder C. Tuttle averages $80 a week! It’s easy, 
with our way of selling shoes. You need no experience. We carry the stock. We ship the shoes. All you do is show 
the styles, take orders! You get cash, prizes, bonuses! 

210 Fast-Selling Styles To Send Your Profits Soaring! 

It’s easy for you to make money fast, with so many new ideas like the Ripple Sole, amazing Shu-lok laceless 
shoe— plus dozens of time-tested, popularity-proven staple items like water-shedding Sylflex shoes, sturdy, 
comfortable, long-wearing work shoes, steel-toe safety shoes, others! Mason shoes sell fast! They’re nationally 
Advertised .. . bear the Good’ Housekeeping Guarantee Seal! Sell to friends, neighbors, folks where you work. 
Top men make up to $10 art hour-from their very first hour! 

Best “Shoe Store Business” in Town! 

You feature foamy-soft Air Cushion innersoles... sturdy steel shanks... Nylon 
IN-THE-JOB SHOES! stitching ... special work soles ofNeoprene, Cork, Cushion Neoprene Crepe. Cus- 

WVB _O_ r In „ ini. nn In sim nthl 


multiply earnings with quantity 
orders, by specializing in shoe 
needs of policemen, postmen, fac¬ 
tory workers, nurses, waitresses, 
service station men! We furnish 
sales aids... show you how to get 
the orders. Don’t delay-mail 
coupon for your FREE Starting 
Outfit today! 


Mr. Ned Mason, Dept. 603 

Mason Shoe Mfg. Co., Chippewa Falls, Wisconsin 

YoO bet I want to earn as much as $960 EXTRA MONTHLY CASH 

by showing your new Ripple Sole Shoe and 209 other proven 

moneymakers! Rush EVERYTHING I need—FREE and postpaid—, 

to start making extra cash at once! 


YOUR SURE SOURCE 
OF EXTRA INCOME! 

Wherever you go, working people 
are eager prospects for famous 
Mason Air Cushion extra-comfort 
on-the-job shoes. That’s why so 
many Mason Shoe Counselors 


: Address. 


.State.